


And I Wanted To Go Home, To Be Where You Are

by Stregatrek



Series: Wish That You Were Here [3]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Asexual Charles Emerson Winchester III, Best attempt at clear communication vis a vis sexualities but it’s 1953, Canon-Typical Drinking, F/F, F/M, Heavy Conversations, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Opera references, Overuse of Religious Imagery, Post-Canon, T rating is again cause war, against his better judgement Charles is a good person, because the author has some Opinions y'all, cause the author is a Catholic y'all, clear communication, pansexual Donna Marie Parker, references to the art and politics of the day, tricking Margaret Houlihan into letting go and living well part one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-14
Updated: 2020-08-14
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:33:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 27,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25894462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Stregatrek/pseuds/Stregatrek
Summary: And I never minded being on my own, then something broke in me and I wanted to go home, to be where you areOn coming home, Charles has to learn that it's not a place anymore
Relationships: Donna Marie Parker/Charles Emerson Winchester III, Margaret Houlihan/Honoria Winchester
Series: Wish That You Were Here [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1844095
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	1. But Even Closer to You, You Seem So Very Far

**Author's Note:**

  * For [onekisstotakewithme](https://archiveofourown.org/users/onekisstotakewithme/gifts).



> all thanks to onekisstotakewithme, who is a Charles/Donna oracle and without whom blueberry pancakes would just be a breakfast food.

When Charles returns to Boston, Honoria meets him at the airport, folding him into a silent hug. His little sister. “H-hello, Charles,” She lets him go, gestures for the driver to take his bags. She doesn’t bother to ask how he is- one look probably tells her enough. “I-I-I’m so g-glad y-you’re home. I _m-missed_ you,” She hugs him again, holding him tightly, and Charles almost cries, his arms around her and his face in her neck. The platform around them is loud and bright, but nothing can take his attention away- this means he’s home. Honoria is here, so he’s home. He’s home. God but he’s glad she’s tall, almost as tall as he is. Taller, in some heels- not these. His mind can’t comprehend that he’s home, focusing instead on meaningless details.

“Why aren’t you wearing your hat? You’ll burn,”

Honoria laughs at him, tears in her voice. “Sh-sh-shut up,”

“ _Honoria_ ,” he hates how his voice catches, but he can’t let go of her. People are staring, he is sure, but with luck no one will recognize him in his uniform. He doesn’t know what he’s supposed to say, what he’s supposed to do. Feelings like this must be why opera was invented. Words alone, gestures alone- the only thing that comes close to communicating this feeling are the throes of an aria. He wishes he could pause the recitative, go downstage and vent his emotions. Unfortunately, real life rather lacks elegant conventions.

“Wh-where’s Donna?”

Stepping back to arm’s length, Charles makes sure she can see his eye-roll. “ _That’s_ what you want to know? Really, Nori, you cannot begin to try to take her from me before I’ve even unpacked, it simply isn’t sporting,”

“I’m n-not going to _poach_ her, I only want to m-meet her,”

Charles laughs, eyes fixed on his sister’s face. “I don’t believe you,” he tells her, smiling.

“W-Welcome home,” Honoria laughs back at him, gesturing for the driver to take his bags. “Come along,” she gestures him imperiously toward their Bentley, and he is glad she hasn’t changed.

“You know, I-” he turns to face her in the back seat, smiling. “I cannot think of a _single_ thing to say,”

Honoria laughs. “Then I will t-tell you all about the l-last s-several weeks,”

“Please,” he smiles, almost wanting to lean over and hug her again, contenting himself with beaming at her as though- well, as though he hadn’t seen her in years. Perhaps it simply hasn’t sunk in yet, but she looks just the same. The city outside the windows of the Bentley looks the same as well. His reflection looks different, in the window- he looks _older_ , older than the few years of the war would seem to warrant, and he wonders if Honoria sees it.

The ride back from the airport is not long, and between the lack of potholes and the reasonable certainty that no snipers had the vehicle in their sights, it’s almost unbelievably smooth.

“Ah, Ithaca,”

Honoria chuckles, shaking her head. “You d-don’t have a Penelope w-waiting yet, brother. When _is_ she c-coming?”

“I’m not entirely sure,” Charles shrugs, a soft smile spreading as he thinks of Donna, of the letters he has tucked safely in his Byron collection. “I left it in her hands- she enjoys making surprise visits,”

“You’re d-different,” his sister straightens his hat. “It’s n-nice. Have you l-learned not to be so c-controlling?”

Charles’ eyebrows go up. “I… hadn’t considered it in that light. I suppose, yes. Or perhaps simply limiting the _number_ of things I control.” War has a way of taking control from a person, he thinks but doesn’t say, closing his eyes briefly.

She tucks her arm through his. “Well, w-we can’t control our p-parents. R-ready to face them?”

Ironically, he gets the urge to throw a salute. “Lead on,”

It is nothing he doesn’t expect, of course, and he’s almost too pleased to be home to worry about facing his parents. To his very great surprise, both of them meet him in the foyer. His father casts an eye over him, and Charles sees the familiar detached disapproval. “Ah, Charles, welcome home. You had a pleasant trip, I trust?” The question more than anything else told him he’d been _gone_. A visit home from Harvard had never even gotten him acknowledged until they all sat down to dinner together. “Quite pleasant, yes, thank you. It is a relief to be back in Boston,”

“I don’t doubt it,” his mother casts a critical eye over him. “Apparently you’ve forgotten that it is not only _you_ seeing Boston; Boston is also seeing _you_.” “ _I’m_ very glad to s-s-see you home,” Nori tucks her hand through his arm.

Their mother sighs. “It’s a shame the uniform is not more flattering. Most men look so dashing in them.”

Charles barely glances down at himself. “Yes, well, the company tailor did better work on frocks, but I opted out of boarding the plane in petticoats. Not knowing how windy the arrivals platform might be, I didn’t care for the thought of Boston seeing _me_ , as it were.”

Honoria laughs, a loud, clear sound Charles hadn’t realized how much he missed until he’s joining in, and he hardly hears his father’s gruff dismissal.

“Come along, Charles, l-let me sh-sh-show you the gardens. I’m having a f-fountain put in,”

“Another one?” He looks around the house as they pass through, everything in its proper place.

Honoria grins. “The J-Japanese embassy has a w-waterf-fall, why shouldn’t I have f-fountains?”

“You are infinitely more elegant than the embassy, and more important by far I daresay,” he smiles back as she kicks off her shoes, barefoot in the grass. “No stockings again, I see.”

“What f-for?” She shrugs. “I w-was only going t-to the airport,”

She shows him the new fountain, its base settled into the ground, and describes the upcoming centerpiece, some tastefully nude statuary she’s commissioned in the Grecian style, and they walk through the roses to the functional fountain. Charles listens to her speak, never so glad for her stutter, as it slows her sentences and makes him feel as though he has all the time in the world to let her finish each thought. The burbling of the fountain is pleasant, and when Honoria turns to look at it, gesturing at some detail, he gives in to mad impulse and pushes her in.

“Charles!” She shrieks as she falls, and kicks a spray of water at him.

He laughs, backing away from the edge quickly, giddy beyond belief. “I missed you, Honoria,”

“F-funny way of t-telling me,” Honoria stands and flings her sodden scarf at him. “You absol-lute _ass_ ,”

Charles is still laughing, even as the scarf hits him in the chest, simply because he can’t remember the last time the world felt bright. (He suspects it was Tokyo, beneath cherry blossoms, but he’ll never quite recall.) He bends to pick up Honoria’s scarf and is caught off-guard when she leaps on him, her wet clothes dampening his uniform. “Ah- Nori! My back-”

“You sh-should h-have thought of that,” but she drops, pushing him instead, and he goes flailing into the fountain. Honoria climbs in with a grace completely mismatched to the circumstance and dunks his head under, against his struggling protests, laughing at him.

For the moment, it’s as though they’re children again, and when Charles comes up for air he splashes Honoria, hitting her with a wave of fountain water that drips from her hair when she shakes it at him, splashing back. They’re both giggling, now, sitting fully-dressed in the fountain, water soaking through Charles’ boots and fairly ruining the last good pair of socks to have survived Korea.

“Mother will be disappointed,” Honoria picks at the sodden lapel of his dress uniform.

“Yes, she was so enthusiastic. Can hardly have my portrait done in it now. I suppose I’ll have to never wear it again,” Charles laughs, breathless, and Honoria’s answering peals of laughter make him smile so hard his face hurts. “My god, Nori, I missed your laugh. I am- I am delighted to be home at last. I only wish Donna were here. You’ll love her, Nori, truly,”

Honoria smiles at him, splashing teasingly. “I already d-do, idiot,”

No one but Donna would believe that he’s sitting in a fountain in his dress uniform. It makes him smile to think of telling her. He hopes with all his might that she arrives soon. In the next five minutes would do nicely.


	2. When I Close My Eyes I Dream In Color, But My Life's In Black and White

After a week, he starts wondering if she’ll telegram him instead of simply arriving. When two weeks have gone by, he wonders if her telegram- or letter- might not have gotten lost in the mail. By the time a month has passed, Honoria voices the question. Wrung out from yet another nightmare, he doesn’t know how to answer.

Days creep by one by one in a horrid procession of painful discovery; his place at Boston General was lost while he was overseas. He’s brought home the nightmares that began in Korea, and a strange form of guilt. His parents behave as though he had been gone a week and somehow returned worse-off than when he left.

Another month goes by, and Charles stops looking up when the mail is brought in. He doesn’t understand, but at the same time he _does_ , of course he does. Honoria gives him pitying looks and his parents still speak of him as though he were a disappointing child. His place at the hospital is not what it once was, and he spends more time staring silently out windows than in any intellectual pursuit. Books can’t hold his attention without music, and music only calls his attention to one place. Who would write to _him_? He wouldn’t. Can he be surprised that she doesn’t, either? Perhaps his conversation was worth something once, but now… he hardly knows what to think, let alone what to say.

It’s foreign, here on American soil, to feel so incapable of communication. Writing to Donna had made him feel optimistic and brave, even in Korea, and _being_ with Donna had made him feel invincible. He misses those feelings, though admittedly not as badly as he misses _her_. There may not be anything left that he would not consider an acceptable trade for one minute with her, one line in the post. But she hasn’t written, he's re-read all of her letters and asked himself a hundred times why there aren't any new ones, and as the seasons change he asks himself why he ever expected a visit, curses himself daily for his inaction, some part of him wanting madly to buy a one-way ticket to Portland and wander the city knocking on doors until he finds her. The thing that stops him is the same thing that’s always stopped him- the fear that he won’t be wanted. The fear that he would, by some miracle, knock on _her_ door and be received with laughter, with dismissal, with cold pity for the fact that he still wasn’t good enough, no matter what he did. There were medals now, framed under his diplomas, and even the weight of his name on the paper seemed likely to make the whole frivolous mockery of success fall off the wall. He could almost hear the crash echo through his life.

“Ch-Charles, come to the opera with m-me,” Honoria is standing in the library doorway, and Charles turns away from his contemplation of the rain, tea in hand. “It’s H-Handel,”

He sighs. Live music is the one medium he has left; something about the theater, being able to see the musicians in the orchestra pit, the singers on the stage, everything choreographed, everything as it should be. “I do not care for Handel, thank you. There is a _reason_ his work was not performed throughout the nineteenth century,”

Honoria rolls her eyes. “I know you d-d-don’t. C-Come anyway.”

“And contribute to this ill-advised Handel revival? To what purpose?”

“B-Because you’re _moping_ , and I w-want you to,”

“I suspect you are offering me pity, not opera.”

“T-take the opera and I w-w-won’t m-make you accept pity,”

Charles holds his pose, shoulders back with his free hand in his pocket, for one moment more. But then, why shouldn’t dignity die on the point of Giulio Cesare’s sword, after all? It had been dispatched far more unceremoniously in Korea. On the point of a rubber chicken, more than once. “Alright, Honoria.” He feels his shoulders fall.

His sister watches him with an unreadable expression, and when she speaks her voice is gentler than usual. “Do you w-want to t-t-talk?”

Charles shakes his head, taking his hand out of his pocket to lift his teacup from its saucer. Funny how everything feels far-away some days, even his own hands. Almost as though he came home from Korea without them, and they go merrily on in some ramshackle operating room, the only part of him to have been needed there staying on for another tour.

“H-have you opened the l-l-letter from Hawkeye?”

“No,” he sighs. “Nor will I.”

Honoria looks at him for a long minute and turns on her heel. Charles looks out the window, thinking of opera. Handel has far too much harpsichord, too early, too English Baroque. He supposes he’ll enjoy it more than a silent dinner with his parents and sitting in the library with a book open, the pages unturned.

Fanciful in a flat way and unable to summon a light note, his heart sings teneste la promessa. Boston does not answer. Worse, there’s no one _to_ answer. God, it’s quiet. Not silent, though- at least he has Honoria. His sister was his pride and joy, always, but now she’s become his confidante. He wishes she didn’t have to be, wishes he had someone else to talk to who stood half a chance of understanding, but- she’s an adult. He missed it, he thinks, somewhere in Korea. Or perhaps he refused to see it, while he was at home, and only gained clarity with distance. Somehow, that’s worse. “‘Dear M-m-major Windbag,’”

“Nori,” Charles turns from the window to see her holding his letter, posed on her high heels like being artificially taller than him made her the eldest sibling.

“‘Things in M-M-Maine are quiet. So quiet, I s-swore I heard you p-p-playing French horn in Boston.” Honoria laughs, her eyes glittering as she glances up at him. “I’m sorry I d-didn’t write ear-earlier, b-but I’ve been spending time at St-Stinson Beach. I th-think I might m-move there. Write me b-b-back when you can; I have a q-question for you.’” Honoria stops, looking at Charles, who’s staring at her and seeing Hawkeye, reclined on his bunk in that tawdry red robe with a martini glass in his hand. “There’s m-more, Charles, do you w-w-want me to r-read on?”

He _misses_ Pierce’s voice, however ludicrous it feels to admit to himself. He misses friendship, however dysfunctional it was, however influenced by external circumstances. Before the war, he hadn’t realized how many of his “friendships” were acquaintances who wanted something from him; and even of those, he’d had precious few. After the war he’d cut ties with many of them, during the few weeks of bravado that came from seeing Honoria, knowing exactly where he was when he woke up every day, and the belief that any minute a Red Cross nurse from the forests of the Great Northwest would knock on his door.

It had been foolish, to move as though he couldn’t be hurt when his dreams were full of darkness and his record player made him flinch. When a car backfiring outside the hospital on his lunch had reduced him to trying to fit his frame behind a fire hydrant for lack of cover. Pierce would understand _that_ at least.

“Yes,” he manages, at last, and Honoria takes a seat in the armchair that faces him.

“‘Other than St-Stinson Beach, I haven’t b-been up to anything. C-C-Crabapple Cove is the s-s-same, thank God. Dad says hello; I t-t-told him about some of the p-pranks we p-pulled on you and he s-says he’s sorry he r-raised me wrong. He’s kidding about that, b-b-but I am sorry. And sorry it t-took my dad telling m-m-me to apologize to d-do it. I feel l-like a kid who g-got sent to say sorry for b-b-breaking a window. I hope your window is easy to f-fix. How’s D-Donna?’” Honoria pauses long enough for Charles to realize that he’s spilling tea on the carpet. When he rights the cup, she continues without comment. “‘I think I’ll b-be in Boston around Christmas to see the l-lights. If I’m n-not in San Francisco! Let me b-b-buy you a drink. B-better yet, you b-buy me a d-drink. Keep in t-touch, Charles. BF Pierce.’”

“Not ‘Hawkeye,’” he says as if that were the most important thing. “I wonder if he really goes by Benjamin Franklin, stateside. That would make his name almost more ridiculous than mine.”

Honoria laughs, though her eyes look worried. “Will you w-write him back?” She asks as though it would be a favor to her to do so, and Charles realizes he’s worried her. That, more than anything, makes him say, “Of course. Before the opera tonight.”

Her smile is genuine, this time. “Good. C-c-can I help?”

“If you’d like,” he says, and now there is something in his life. There’s a letter to write to his former tent-mate. It isn’t much, but it’s more than he had five minutes prior. “Thank you,” he says to Honoria, sincerely. “For reading his letter.”

She looks at him as though he’s lost whatever sense she still thought he had. “Of c-c-course,”

In the end, the letter to Pierce feels hollow, with so many things he doesn’t know how to say being omitted entirely, and he is frustrated yet again that he, _he_ with his complete mastery of the spoken and written word cannot seem to find an acceptable way to put down the thought that he is lost in a city he knows like the back of his hand.

Still, Honoria looks satisfied as she seals the letter, and they drop it in the post on the way to the opera.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Teneste la promessa is an aria from my fave opera sung by a dying woman abandoned by her lover (yeah Charlie u dramatic bitch she’s coming hold ur horses)   
> https://youtu.be/bGUzY74TtfU  
> https://www.opera-arias.com/verdi/la-traviata/teneste-la-promessa/
> 
> title for this chapter comes from Monochromatic, a lovely song by Mary Lambert https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwQ1GXxKqQE&list=PLO6w7l3Dm6OgvhAtjXEnNsdEEwA7RFikd&index=15


	3. Baby, You're My Holy Ghost and I Need You Close; Come Back to Me

Charles spends his time waiting for Hawkeye’s reply, and he hates himself for that. Shifts at the hospital are a merciful distraction, and he arrives home late one night, excusing himself to the library before dinner.

He settles in with _A Tale of Two Cities_ \- and it truly was the best of times, it was beyond a doubt the worst of times… there is nothing before us, there is everything before us… _Chuck, you’re wordy as Dickens_.

With a sigh, he sets the book aside and stands to find another. Honoria enters without knocking. “Ch-Charles,” she’s tamping down a smile ineffectually. “C-come down,” He sighs, puts his hands in his pockets. “What _now_?”

“You’ll s-see,” she says, and gestures him out of the library ahead of her, and at the top of the stairs to the foyer he stops, frozen, wondering if he’s gone mad or if he’s dreaming or if somehow, impossibly, it’s really his own heart he can feel thundering in his chest, his own hand shaking slightly where it grasps the balustrade.

“Oh,” his breath out is slight, and his feet rush down the stairs ahead of all thought, and he must make more noise than he hears himself make because his vision turns to look, no longer in profile, and the sight of her face is enough to send his heart beating a triumphant caro bella piu amabile belta.

“Hello, love,” She smiles.

“Donna!” It’s undignified to shout, the staff are staring, and he doesn’t care, he can’t care, he’s not sure he’s even fully noticed his own actions or their consequences because she’s smiling at him and she’s _real_.

“Chuck!” She’s in his arms, then, and if he thought himself oblivious to the world around them before that it’s nothing compared to this moment.

He holds her tightly and forgets to worry about whether or not she can breathe, bending slightly to wrap his arms around her waist and lift her, spinning. She shrieks happily, his name, god that stupid bastardization of his name, “Chuck! Put me down, Chuck, I’m gonna lose a shoe,” she’s laughing, her hands on his chest, her forehead pressed to his, and he sets her down but it’s only so he can kiss her.

“Donna,” he says, not separating from her by more than absolutely necessary for a word to escape between them, “Donna,”

Her arms wind around his neck, then, and she pulls herself tight to him, on her toes. “Hello, Charles,” she murmurs against his mouth. The vibration of her voice against his lips nearly knocks him off his feet. “Didja miss me?”

“More than words can express, my angel.” He kisses her again, unable to resist lifting her up to spin once more. “You’re _here_ ,” he realizes, belatedly, as the cherry blossom scent of her hair fills his nose and his mind. “You- you actually _came_.”

“Did you not want me to?”

“ _No_ ,” He’s holding her, and he can’t squeeze her more tightly than he is. “I- _yes_ , Donna, I wanted you to come, more than anything, but I- I didn’t think you would.”

She smiles, her hand on his cheek. “I’m not the love ‘em and leave ‘em type, Chuck.”

He flushes red, setting her down, hands on her shoulders. “Donna, my dear, my _love_ -”

“Oh, say that again,” She’s smiling, holding his face in her hands, oh god she actually did it, oh good god she’s actually here.

“My love,” he obeys instantly. “My love, Donna, I adore you, I _missed_ you, Donna,”

Her thumbs are stroking his cheeks, she’s on her toes, still flush against him from thighs to mouth, and he can’t believe she’s real but no dream feels like _that_. “Charles, I missed you too.” she kisses him, and he gets lost in the feeling, almost overwhelmed and glad of it. She tastes like chocolate and coffee, and her mouth is so soft on his. When she breaks the kiss, leaning back with a sigh, he doesn’t open his eyes, wishing to live in that moment. He feels as though he’s slept a hundred years and doesn’t know if he’s finally awake or if this is the best dream he’s ever had. Her hands are gentle on his face, her voice somehow both teasing and impossibly affectionate when she says,“Oh, Cuddles, I- I _love_ you,”

“ _C-Cuddles_?”

Ah, there’s his inevitable reminder of reality. Charles winces, and Donna laughs. He opens his eyes to look at her again, and once he starts he can’t tear his eyes from her, but she turns her face toward Honoria’s voice. “Army nickname. Everyone had one, you know? Hawkeye, Radar, Cuddles,”

“ _Don’t_ ,” Charles’ voice comes out choked, and he clears his throat. “Donna Marie, darling, please.”

She looks back at him, smiling, eyes dancing. “Then introduce us properly.”

He sighs, unable to let her go, hands on her shoulders still even as he steps back to what could almost be called a polite distance. “Donna Marie Parker, my sister, Honoria.”

“Charmed,” Donna holds out her hand, taking Honoria’s and kissing it with a wink. Charles reflexively tightens his hold on her shoulders, thumbs stroking softly, reassuring himself that she is real, she is here, and she just kissed the daylights out of him in the foyer. He’s floating somewhere in the atmosphere, watching the world turn below him until Tokyo rolls around.

“L-likewise,” Honoria is grinning. “W-welcome to B-Boston,”

“Thanks,” Donna says, looking back at Charles, running a hand up his chest to rest on his shoulder, and he comes back to Earth with that touch. “I think it’s my new favorite city in the world,”

Honoria makes a small sound. “We d-do have excellent w-weather,” She says drily.

Donna laughs, staring up at Charles. “Yes. It’s definitely the weather.”

“It’s raining,” he says, stupidly, staring back at her and knowing a beat too late that they’re teasing. Donna just smiles, cupping his cheek, and he turns his face into the touch as though she is the sun and he is a flower.

“Yeah, it is,” she agrees. “Good thing I had somewhere to come in to get out of it,”

“Always,” he tells her, pressing her hand to his cheek. It feels like he could live in these few minutes, seeing her again, holding her close, looking into her beautiful eyes. He wishes these few minutes would last forever. Perhaps God will finally grant his wish and stop the sun in the sky.

Of course, his luck is not that good.

“I believe introductions may be in order,”

Charles winces, watching Honoria pivot so quickly her hair flips over her shoulders. “M-mother, meet Donna Marie Parker,”

Letting go of Donna but for her hand, which he holds so tightly in his own that he worries it may hurt, Charles leads her over to his mother, who is standing in the doorway with her eyebrows raised. “I came to investigate the commotion, Charles, you’re quite disrupting the evening,”

“Yes. Mother, this is my- this is Donna,”

“Charmed,” Donna holds out her free hand, easy and graceful, smiling like the dawn, and his mother’s eyes move between them as she takes Donna’s hand, greeting politely. “It’s wonderful to meet you, Mrs. Winchester,”

Honoria steps into the conversation. “Join us for d-dinner, Donna,” she invites smoothly, as though there isn’t a suitcase on the floor behind them, knocked over when Charles spun Donna around the room like he was in a dream. A dream he’s being rather rudely awakened from by the chill in his mother’s eyes that still makes his spine straighten. The sensation reminds him of the time Pierce and Hunnicutt substituted a bucket of ice water for reveille.

“I’d love to,” Donna says with a smile, looking up at him, and he smiles back despite his nerves.

Dinner is like racing the salad course all over again. He knows Honoria won’t talk out of turn, knows their parents are interested in Donna, but listening to her speak and watching his father’s face is like seeing the bowl of lettuce being brought out and realizing his words are no longer welcome.

She is remarkably composed, and he watches her in awe, her easy laughter and deflections, the glittering teasing glances she throws his way. It’s impossible to fully comprehend that she is there, having dinner with his parents and Honoria, sitting at the dining table beside him. He pinches the inside of his wrist below the table between courses, feeling ridiculous but unable to imagine that he will not wake up. He wonders if she notices that he stares at her more than he speaks, and that it is Honoria’s good graces which see Donna installed in the guest bedroom down the hall from his own when dinner is adjourned. The long flights have worn her out, she explains, and he hangs on her words as though they are the sermon from the mount, listening to the cadence of her voice. He carries her suitcase up the stairs for her, and she takes his hand. “Thank you,”

“Donna,” he strokes his fingertips down her face. “I… I cannot believe you are here,”

She turns her face to kiss the heel of his hand, and he trembles at the sensation, feeling as though every inch of his skin is attuned to her presence, the fact that it is her, here at last. “Good night, Charles. I promise I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“Good night, Donna,” he kisses the back of her hand before he lets it go, and almost says he loves her but stops, a distant tinge of embarrassment at the greeting he’d given her creeping up the back of his neck. The door closes between them, and he can’t walk away, looking out the window that ends the hallway.

“Charles,” Honoria’s voice startles him, standing at the end of the hall staring out at the rain.

“Hm?”

“I can s-see her too,”

Relieved and chagrined in equal parts, Charles looks at Donna’s closed door. “Oh. Good.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Caro bella is a rare Handel duet, for Cesare and Cleopatra at the end of Giulio Cesare and it’s not only very beautiful but also very over the top and sappy (hello operatic conventions of the 18th century where arias are “lots of feelings very loudly”)  
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvyWfsWxPMc
> 
> chapter title from BORNS Holy Ghost https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HDNb3rcZ7EM


	4. So This is What Makes Life Divine

Donna can’t sleep, her mind bouncing coast to coast and overseas. Forget eighty days, she thinks to herself when she checks the clock and it’s only two. I can get around the world twice a night, going like this. She sighs, staring at the canopy in the dark. Wonders what Charles would do if she snuck into his room and smiles to herself. She might try it, only she doesn’t know which room is his. She’ll have to figure that out tomorrow. Later today? She checks the clock again, and eventually she thinks she sleeps, but it’s still just before five when she rises, wrapping the dressing gown from the back of the door around herself.

Downstairs, Charles and Honoria are sitting close together at one end of the great table, both in dressing gowns, with a coffee tray between them. Donna stops when she sees them, nerves cascading down her spine to beat like the ocean in her stomach, realizing only right then that she’s spent the night in Charles’ house, that she’s here, that this is a precipice and she’s stepped off. She thinks yesterday was like a cartoon- she walked through the air, oblivious to the ground having ended, but now, seeing the Winchester siblings sitting together in the early morning, she’s looked down.

Honoria looks lovely; the dressing gown Charles got her in Tokyo layers beautifully with her golden pyjamas, and her thick brown hair is piled on her head in a glamorously messy way Donna thought was reserved for Hollywood actresses and singers. Charles looks a little like he lost a mud wrestling match with the devil. His curly hair is puffed on end and he’s slumped in his chair, clutching his coffee cup like it holds answers even God doesn’t know.

“Good morning,” Donna says. “I didn’t expect to find anyone up.”

Honoria looks significantly at Charles. “Good morning, my dear,” he looks up at her with a smile, eyes tired as he straightens himself in his seat. “How did you sleep?”

“Well,” Donna lies in reply, accepting the cup of coffee Honoria holds out for her. “And you?” She remains standing, not sure if she should take the chair on his other side and somewhat irrationally wanting to kiss the top of his head.

“Quite well,” Charles drinks his coffee.

Honoria rolls her eyes. “Don’t l-lie to her, b-b-brother,” She looks up at Donna, clear-eyed despite the ungodly hour, and Donna thinks Honoria might know she had been lying, somehow. “I d-d-don’t think he’s s-slept a full n-n-night since g-getting home,”

Donna feels her face pull in concern just the way her heart does, reaching out to touch Charles’ shoulder. “Nightmares?” He looks up at her, forehead wrinkling, one of his hands coming to rest atop the one she has on his shoulder. His thumb strokes the back of her hand, and she bends to kiss the top of his head. It feels like a conversation. You’re here? I’m here. We’re doing this? We are. Donna doesn’t know how to say it any better than in deed; she knows exactly why she came to Boston, and doesn’t mean to give it any less than her all. “You can tell me, Chuck. It’s alright.”

He sighs heavily. Donna can hear the ticking of a grandfather clock in the silence that precedes his next words, and wonders which room it’s in, how loud it has to be that she can hear it in here. “I… Yes, I find my dreams- somewhat disturbing.”

Making an understanding sound, Donna sinks into the chair beside him, pulling it close to rest one hand on his knee, the other keeping hold of the one that took hers while it was on his shoulder. “Sometimes I have dreams about the shelling. Sometimes I _know_ the 4077 is being shelled. Yours wouldn’t happen to go anything like that, would they?”

Charles squeezes her hand tightly, but it’s Honoria who casts her a thankful look. “It’s OR, more often than not,” Charles admits quietly. “Though on occasion it’s the shelling.”

“I’m sorry,” Donna says. “Have you talked to anyone about it? We had some great psychiatrists in Tokyo, I’m sure there’s a good one around here somewhere,”

Shaking his head, Charles answers, “no, I have not. I… Winchesters do not need therapy.” He says the word as though the act of sitting down in a psychiatrist’s armchair would be tantamount to leaping from the balconies of Heaven.

Donna sighs through her nose and looks at Honoria. “Am I ever gonna hear the end of the family name?”

Charles flinches under her hands; she squeezes softly. Honoria shakes her head no, and Charles says, “Donna, really, I-”

“You need to talk to someone, Chuck. Really talk. We can listen, but there’s only so much… I went to see a shrink when I got back. Even just a few times really makes a difference; now when I wake up from one of those shelling dreams I don’t panic as bad, or get the urge to walk around the states until I’ve checked that every single person I care about is safe. It won’t go away, but it can get manageable. I can teach you the tricks she taught me- maybe some of them will work for you.”

“You n-need to sleep,” Honoria’s voice is soft, but her face is stern as she looks at her brother over the rim of her coffee cup.

He sighs. “I am _aware_ , thank you,”

“Could I bribe you?” Donna asks, teasing.

Charles smirks as he draws himself up in his seat. “Winchesters cannot be bought, my dear.”

She laughs. “I didn’t say buy, I said bribe. I have something much more valuable than money,”

He looks askance at her. “I dou-”

Leaning in, she kisses him softly, barely resting their lips together, moving slowly and letting the friction build. He trembles under her hands, leaning into the kiss, and she relents, catching his lower lip between hers and biting as softly as she can, pulling his lower lip into her mouth for a bare second that has him shaking. “There. See? Better bribe than cash any day.” She draws back, opening her eyes and smiling. “So; you owe me getting yourself a therapist.”

His eyes are closed, face slack, and Donna thinks she’s never seen anything more beautiful in her life. “I- I didn’t agree to terms,”

“Too bad,” she grins. “I hear tell of one Sidney Freedman in this neck of the woods,”

“New York,” Charles counters, eyes opening slowly to look at her as though she hung the moon.

Donna nods. “Yeah, East Coast. Everything’s close over here. We could pop down for the day, Honoria and I could go to a show, you could see Sidney,” she makes her voice light and easy, as though the idea were a picnic plan rather than psychotherapy- something he seems almost more averse to than he was to the dentist, which if Hawkeye’s letter on the subject was to be believed seems nigh impossible.

“I will… consider the idea. In the meantime, my dear, there is a new installation opening at the gallery tonight. Would you accompany me?”

Donna smiles. “I’d love to. Who’s the artist?”

Charles shrugs.

“F-French surrealist collection,” it’s Honoria who answers. “T-T-Traveling exhibition,”

“Sounds interesting. I’m game,”

“Excellent. Th-then we’ll all go,”

This turns out to be easier said than done, as Charles’ parents meet the plan with frigid looks over lunch. Donna is trying not to feel detested, but they’re not making it easy. Charles holding her hand under the table helps, and when he meets his parents’ resistance with an easy shrug and a tight, “Nevertheless,” she answers Honoria’s covert smile with one of her own. Charles _did_ promise they’d break rules, the three of them. Maybe they’ll go to the exhibition and ruthlessly mock the art, get champagne drunk and start pointless arguments on purpose. She wonders how it’s been, since he came home. Has he broken all the rules already, or did he wait for her?

The gallery turns out to be a beautiful building, full of people she almost recognizes. Some of them she swears are carbon copies of the people she puts up with at parties back home, and she’s glad she brought a few nice outfits. Still, on Charles’ arm, people are staring, and by the third time he leans down to murmur in her ear some East Coast society name or make a pithy comment about the other attendees, she’s becoming aware that this is more than she bargained for. But then, Donna Marie Parker has always been the type whose courage rises at every attempt to intimidate her, so she puts her shoulders back and shoots smug smiles at the people who stare.

Charles is looking more at her than at the paintings, and she glances up to see his lips curved into a soft smile. “What is it?”

“You’re beautiful,” he answers in a low voice. “And even surrounded by art there is nothing I would rather look at; surrounded by people there is no one I would rather speak to. I am simply overwhelmed by your sudden presence, my dear, as incredibly welcome as it may be. You are- you are incandescent, Donna Marie, you are illuminated like an angel on stained glass, and simply by your presence I am blinded to all else.”

She blushes. “I missed you too, Chuck.”

“Shorter compliments,” he smiles, the smile that wrinkles his nose, and Donna can’t help but reach up and kiss him. It astounds her that she can do that, that he’s close enough to kiss.

“There,” She says with a grin. “You’re so handsome, Charles. Now come over here, I think I recognize that one,”

Charles looks, easily peering over the heads of the other attendees. “The one with the metronome- I think? Donna, is that intended to be a metronome?”

Donna tugs him along with her, smiling. “That’s the one,”

They look at it, Donna enjoying the shades and angles, suspecting that Charles is indulging her. Well, that’s more than alright. She slips her hand through his elbow properly and squeezes softly. “You look marvelous tonight, Charles,” she says softly. “It’s good to see you in something that isn’t olive drab.”

He leans over to kiss her hair. “I could say the same about you, my dear, but you managed to make even olive drab shockingly beautiful.”

“Stop, no one looks good in Red Cross clothes,” she laughs. It’s incredible how comfortable she feels, touching him, teasing him- it runs through her mind and her focus drifts away from the art. Tokyo, the 4077 when he didn’t remember her, some cautious but promising letters, the 4077 when he _did_ remember her, and letters that made her heart sing like a caged bird there in the depths of war. And now, this, here, alive and stateside and everything she’d hoped for- it’s incredible at the same time it manages to be completely terrifying. She thinks again that she has stepped off a precipice without looking, but so far it seems he’s broken her fall, sweeping her up in his arms and spinning gleefully. “Charles,” she looks up at him, her voice thick. He looks down, brows raised and expression in his eyes tender.

“Yes?”

“Dr. Winchester,” a jovial voice interrupts them. “Good of you to come!”

Donna and Charles turn almost in sync, and Charles says, “Good evening, Josep; I hadn't expected to see you here”

A man with rapidly whitening hair stops in front of them, his eyes on Donna even as he shakes Charles' hand. “Ah, and who is this,”

“This,” Charles looks back down at her, expression proud and soft. Donna can’t believe anyone is looking at her like that, much less him. The more she learns about him, the more awed she is that he let her draw smiley faces on his knees, the more awed she is that he holds her dear. “Is Donna Marie Parker,”

The man takes the hand she offers, shaking rather than kissing. “Of the New York Parkers?”

She smiles. “Portland Parkers, actually.” As though that means anything, with a lineage one generation old. “Visiting the East Coast on loan, much like the pictures,” she gestures around the gallery.

“Donna, my dear,” Charles says, “allow me to introduce Josep Lluis Sert. He is bringing his art to Harvard,” Charles smiles, a polite smile with just enough warmth that Donna thinks it’s real.

The man grins in return, shaking his head. “I am working on several overseas projects as well. Sadly I am not here for the- alumni,” he inclines his head to Charles and looks around the room. “Ah- Georges,” he waves a hand laconically, and Donna turns to see the newcomer. “Georges Braque, Charles Winchester and Donna Parker,”

The elderly man bows over her hand. “Charmante,” He smiles. “How do you like my work?”

Charles makes a dismissive sound. “The followers of Picasso have never been to my taste,”

“The _followers_!” Sert exclaims as Braque’s polite smile takes on a fixed quality.

“I’m very fond of the more abstract ones,” Donna says, gesturing to _Still Life With Metronome_. It’s not quite enough to smooth Braque’s expression, but Sert relaxes visibly. “Please excuse my date, he’s rather embittered about the Cubist movement,” she laughs, absolutely no idea what he thinks of the Cubist movement, but there’s no better time to find out, and Charles’ hand squeezes hers as his eyes cut to her reprovingly.

“What Donna means to say is that I have never found much value in rearranging human features as though they were pieces of a puzzle,”

“But you are a doctor!” Braque fairly cries. “Surely you have moved pieces to make them fit in new and beautiful ways!”

Charles’ brow arches. “Perhaps in _functional_ new ways,” he allows, almost hearing Pierce's voice giving instruction to take tissue from one place and put it in another. “When necessary.”

“Beauty is a function of art.”

“Oh, I couldn’t agree more,” Donna smiles.

“Your beauty is not,” Charles says to her sotto voce as though they were alone, and she looks up at him wide-eyed.

“Are you saying my beauty is artless?”

He hesitates. “I- yes, in that it is not contrived.”

“You think art can’t be natural?”

"Cubism is certainly unnatural."

Sert laughs heartily. “Come along, Georges, we ought to leave them to it- a lover’s quarrel over Cubism, eh, delightful,” he leads his friend away, though Donna doubts that Charles has made himself a friend in either of them.

“ _Finally_ ,”

“We talked to them for less than two minutes,” Donna points out.

“Interminable.”

She laughs. “You need to get out more, Chuck.”

“Perhaps you will do me the honor of taking me out on occasion,”

“When I can get chaperone approval,” Donna teases. “Where _is_ Honoria, anyway?”

Charles doesn’t look away from her, shrugging. “Causing trouble, no doubt,”

“Trouble we should go get her out of?”

“Trouble we should stay as far away from as possible.”

“At least until we hear the sound of noses being broken,”

He chuckles, “yes, something like that,” he leads her to the bar, where a swan sculpted from ice is regarding the room imperiously even as it melts. “Allow me to buy you a drink,” he says to her. To the bartender- “two champagnes,”

“Maybe I should buy. That way I can cut you off before you try to wear a painting,”

Charles flushes. “My dear-”

“Oh, come on, that always made you laugh before.” Donna leans on the bar, turning to look out at the gallery. “Jokes about the night we met can’t stop being funny just because you’re fancy now.”

“ _Fancy now_?” Charles sets money on the counter without looking away from her, handing her a flute of champagne.

Donna takes a sip and rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean. Nobody was fancy in Korea- you came the closest, I’ll give you that, but,” she gestures around the room. “There were hardly art galleries alongside OR.”

“True enough,” he allows with a slight sigh. “But, Donna… We might be overheard,”

She looks around the room, full of people hoping they’re wearing all the right fancy clothes trying to say all the right fancy things. They might as well be paintings, too, for as real as they feel to her anymore. She’s tired of parties like this. At least when Charles upsets Cubist painters he’s saying _something_. “So? I can’t tease my boyfriend just because- Charles?” He’s choked on champagne, coughing.

“Your- your- nevermind,”

“My boyfriend,” Donna grins. “Unless you want me to call you lover.”

Bright crimson, Charles says, “No, thank you,”

“Boyfriend,” she says it again, loving the way his mouth twists as he grimaces. “Come on, it’s not that bad, is it, to be my boyfriend?”

He shakes his head. “It’s not the sentiment, darling, it’s the _word_.”

“Do you want me to go around introducing you as my ex-husband?” She grins.

“ _No_ ,”

“You just wanna be my date until we’re dead, huh?”

“Something like that,” he looks into his champagne glass more than at her, and Donna drops it, trying to think of another topic of conversation- and catches sight of Honoria, a good six inches taller than most of the women there, and wearing heels to boot. She’s talking to Braque, who seems to find the younger Winchester much more agreeable than the elder- Donna wonders how long that’ll last. Does Honoria have higher opinions of Cubism?

Looking up at Charles from over the rim of her glass, Donna says, “You know that Braque painted _with_ Picasso, don’t you? I think they’re friends,”

Charles shrugs. “Modern art is devolving into incomprehensible lines. I confess I don’t much care which artist splashed a pail of shapes on a canvas first.”

“Oh, my god,” Donna snorts, tempted to put her face in her hands as she sees someone on Charles’ other side shoot him a look that could peel the paint right off the canvases around them. “I can’t take you anywhere, can I?”

He tilts his head. “I’m afraid I don’t-”

“You get drunk in Tokyo, sleep through my visit in the Korean countryside, and you _don’t even like modern art_.” She’s smiling, teasing him, and gives an overdone shrug as she says, “I suppose we’ll just have to spend all our time alone together, since clearly interacting with other people isn’t your strong suit,”

Charles draws himself up, shoulders squared. “My dear, if you weren’t so lovely, and the prospect of being alone with you for any amount of time, hearing what you think on every topic under the sun weren’t such an appealing idea, I would be quite offended at the moment,”

“Good thing I’m irresistible,”

“Yes, you are,” Charles agrees with a smile. “Perhaps you ought to accompany me to the symphony. I’ve been told I do my best work in the dark,”

Donna laughs. “Sitting alone not speaking to other people?”

“Something like that,” Charles bends to kiss her gently, and Donna smiles.

She looks around the room again when he draws back. “So, anyone you know?”

“Of course,” he takes a drink of champagne. “Unfortunately.”

“Unfortunately?”

He shrugs. “Growing up with these people… it’s all rather- well, stifling. Honoria’s is the only interesting conversation, aside from your own. Unless of course you would like to hear the opinions of people who have quite literally no idea what they’re talking about.”

“What do you mean?”

Charles bends closer. “You see the woman in the red dress? That is Miss Victoria Applebaum. When I returned home, she insisted on telling me all the benefits of the military, the ‘police action,’ in short; everything I understand and she does not. When I attempted to contradict her with lived experience, however… the conversation no longer merited her attention.”

“Ugh,” Donna frowns. “I guess I can’t say I’m surprised. Lots of the parties at home were like that. Someone would ask me a question, I’d answer honestly, and… the conversation would move on without me. I guess- I guess we don’t fit in, anymore.”

Staring out at the room, Charles says, “It makes me wonder how I ever did,”

Donna leans into his shoulder, sipping her champagne, watching Honoria gesture animatedly at Braque. It looks as though she’s lost his good opinion, but he can’t escape the force of her personality as she speaks. “Good evening, Charles,”

Charles looks around. “Ah, good evening, Mrs. Michelson. May I introduce Donna Marie Parker,” his arm is loose around her shoulders, and Donna glances briefly down at his hand on her upper arm- it’s so warm, so much bigger than she remembers-

“How do you do?” Donna pulls her attention back and offers her hand to shake, which gets her an arched brow.

“Charmed, I’m sure,” the elderly woman says, barely looking at her. “Tell me, Charles, where are your parents?” Her voice is the imperious tone of a distant aunt.

With almost exaggerated patience, Charles answers, “They are at home, Mrs. Michelson. Modern art is not to their taste.”

“And it is to yours,”

He inclines his head toward Donna, meeting her eyes. “It is… growing on me,”

Mrs. Michelson follows his gaze. “Hm, you know, when I heard you had at last brought a date to a function, I hadn’t pictured her being… new money.”

Donna wonders how exactly the old woman guessed, but she’s not about to spend the night self-conscious about something she can’t change. Particularly not at the behest of someone born before the turn of the century. She’s reassured when Charles’ arm tightens on her as he lifts his chin. "It’s quite amazing how rarely taste is inherited along with wealth." His voice outdoes the icy swan on the bar that Donna had admired earlier. She glances up at him, surprised that he can even sound like that. “Luckily, that is not a deficiency of the _Winchester_ line,”

“Well, it certainly wasn’t with your parents,” Mrs. Michelson agrees, her tone polite, and Donna feels her smile go fixed.

Charles ignores that as though he didn’t hear it at all. “Tell me, Mrs. Michelson, how are your son and his wife the nanny?”

It’s clearly too obvious a dig, but Donna has to hold back a laugh- Charles’ expression shows precisely what he thinks of marrying household staff. “Mitchell and his wife are well- if you’ll excuse me.” She doesn’t spare a look for Donna, who is giggling as soon as the old woman’s back is turned.

“Mitchell? Mitchell Michelson?”

Charles smiles, a tiny laugh escaping as he tells her, “Junior. And his wife’s name is Michelle,”

Donna lets out a bark of laughter that makes several people turn to look. “Well- well that’s why he married her! Have to keep that naming convention going. What-” She giggles helplessly, laughing now just because Charles is laughing too, looking down at her as though she’s cast a spell on him. “What do you think they’ll name their children,”

“Mitch-elle,”

Donna snorts. “ _No_ , Chuck, that was awful,” she giggles. “Michelin,”

“ _Donna_ ,” He takes her by the elbows, still laughing, and bends to kiss her lightly. “Let’s leave,”

She loves the way he’s smiling at her, the soft delight in his eyes. “Yeah,” she finishes her champagne and sets the glass on the bar. “Finish your drink, love,”

He tosses back his champagne and makes a face as the bubbles crawl up his nose. “Oh, god,”

“No, you can just call me Donna,” she says, and then they’re laughing again as he draws her away from the bar, hand in hand.

Charles clears his throat as he approaches his sister. “Honoria, this is _intolerable_ ,”

Honoria looks over her shoulder with a laugh “Really? I w-was having fun. D-d-did you meet Sert’s friend B-Braque? He’s easy to w-wind up,”

Donna laughs. “I think Charles put him on edge.”

Honoria grins, “Oh, is that what d-d-did it?” She shakes her head at her brother. “Come on, l-let’s s-say our goodbyes.”

“To _whom_?”

“Sert, stupid” Honoria rolls her eyes, “If you’ll r-recall, you like him,” she says, leading the way to the architect. “P-Pardon me,” she steps easily into the conversation. “I w-wanted to wish you well, s-sir, I hope t-to see you again soon,”

He bows over her hand. “Always a pleasure, Miss Winchester. Good evening, Charles- wonderful to meet you, my dear,” he kisses Donna’s hand. “I hope to see you again. Perhaps at the next alumni dinner. Charles has never brought a guest, and I hope he makes an exception to that rule for you.”

Donna grins. “I’d like that. We’re amateur rule-breakers, actually.” She laughs. “Good night,”

The ride home is uneventful, Donna leaning on Charles’ shoulder and holding his hand as she listens to the Winchester siblings trade cutting remarks at the expense of the other party guests. She smiles when Honoria defends Braque and Charles harrumphs. “You’re cute,” she tells him, quiet.

“My dear,” he’s blushing slightly. “You are… too kind.”

“Is that your way of saying you hate the word cute? How does it compare to ‘boyfriend?’”

Honoria laughs, and Charles doesn’t reply. They arrive at the house and he wishes Donna goodnight with a kiss, but she doesn’t find herself tired. It only takes a moment to decide what she’s going to do- and she checks that the hallway is clear of family members or staff before she picks the lock on his door quietly and comes in, looking around. Something thuds in the closet, and she smiles.

Donna leans on his closet doorframe. "You know, Chuck, for a man I met swimming in a punch bowl, you can be a pretty rough party guest."

He stops, looking up at her. He's got his vest halfway off, and she has to admit she likes the feeling of standing there, seeing the lines in his forehead deepen in his surprise. It's domestic, between his expression and state of undress, and she smiles softly as he stammers, "Donna! Donna, I- I'm changing."

"Did you want me to cover my eyes, Chuck? I've seen it all, remember." Her soft smile becomes a full-blown grin. "I've got that picture of your legs in my wallet, still. It’s a prized possession.”

He pulls the vest closed, cheeks reddening. "How- how did you get in my room?"

Donna rolls her eyes. "You're picking up your sister's cute stutter, Chuck. Come on, I picked the lock, how did you think? I locked it behind me again. I wanted to see you."

Charles looks at her for a long moment, and Donna wonders if he's upset with her for the first time, opening her mouth to apologize when he starts to laugh. "I'm- sorry, my dear, I'm not laughing at you," he lets the vest go and shrugs out of it, his hands moving to his collar. "It's simply that I find myself so unable to believe that you are truly here, I keep- it's _you_ , Donna, _my_ Donna Marie. My angel." He reaches for her now, taking her hands and kissing them. "I apologize for my rather stiff party etiquette. I- I honestly keep waiting for you to disappear. For all that I rarely find sleep, these days, looking at you I feel as though I am dreaming." He sighs. “It’s true, too, that my lack of sleep has reduced what was already a low tolerance for foolish people.”

Donna smiles, resting her hand on his chest, wondering how many layers one person can wear- his undershirt is the same color as his shirt. "I'm not going anywhere until you tell me to, Chuck, and I understand- we’ve got to find a way for you to get more sleep."

"I- you intend to _stay_? Even- after my parents, and the gallery,"

Shaking her head, Donna smiles up at him. "You think we don't have jerks on the West Coast, Chuck? I've been to parties like that before. I'm not going to say I loved it, but it was fun to watch you in your natural habitat. And I've never seen you wear your hair like this," she runs a hand through the flattened curls, puffing them up, and he grimaces as though he can see the result. "If you're trying to scare me into disappearing on you, Charles, you're going to have to try harder."

His hands settle on her waist. "Not at all, my dear, I- that is the last scenario on earth I would desire."

Donna grins up at him, feeling like she could fly. She doesn’t really need to, to reach her destination; her heels lift off the ground as she lets the lightness flow, and on her toes she’s at a perfect height to murmur, “May I kiss you, Chuck?”

“Please do, my dear,”

Slowly, she tips her face to press their lips together. He doesn’t open his mouth, and she doesn’t try to make him. It feels perfect, to be pressed against him like his, just touching, his hands light on her. “You know, I just came to see you. But I wanted- I _want_ to stay. As long as you’ll have me,”

Charles’ arms wrap around her, holding her close. “In case I did not make it clear enough in my letters, my angel, I would have you forever if you were willing.”

Donna smiles, turning her face to kiss his cheek. “Oh, Charles. I love you.”

“I love you too, Donna Marie,” Charles smiles down at her. "'Tu l'as dit oui je t'aime; speak again and prolong my heart's dream.'"

Donna rolls her eyes. "God, Chuck, don't quote _Les Huguenots_ at me, it's not a good opera. Falling in love with someone the first night you meet them? Please,"

Charles laughs softly, delighted, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he looks at her. "It's _not_ a very good opera, is it? But then, grand opera; always so..."

"Overdone,"

"Well, I was going to say vulgar," Charles tells her, one hand brushing down her face. "I... am so very pleased to be holding you like this, discussing opera."

She holds him tightly, smiling. “I'm very glad to be being held. Can I do anything to help you sleep?”

“One thing I- Donna, every night in my life I have slept without you in my arms pales in comparison to the _one_ time that I had you. Will- will you stay, tonight?”

“Yes,” Donna beams. “I would love to, Charles, really. I would have come in last night, but I didn’t know which room was yours,” She laughs, and he smiles at her. "Finish undressing, darling, I've seen it all before," she winks at him as she lets him go, twirling, leaning on the edge of the bed. "And I want to again."

"Not _all_ ," he avoids her eyes, unbuttoning his shirt as bidden.

She thinks he’s trying to make a joke- his smile is flickering. "Oh, true," Donna laughs as she kicks off her heels, giddy with the thought of holding him. "I got to see your legs, but I've never seen you shirtless."

Donna starts to undo her own shirt, figuring turnabout is fair play, but he’s not looking at her, seeming suddenly to find the flooring in the doorway of the closet the most fascinating piece of woodwork imaginable. "That's true. However, I was referring to 'all' as in- I'm afraid I put on rather a lot of weight, after I last saw you,"

Donna shrugs, smiling at him. "You look good, Charles."

"Good as in 'happier' or 'dressed in something that isn’t an army uniform' perhaps."

"No, good as in you're very pretty. Would you rather I said handsome? That too. And I've never seen you shirtless, which seems rather silly all things considered, so I'd like to rectify the situation. Can I?"

He looks up at her now, eyes wide. "You actually _want_ to?"

"’Course I do, Chuck. You're gorgeous." She smiles softly at him, watching him blush. "But if you don't want to show me tonight, I can cover my eyes like I did before." For a long moment, he simply looks at her. She remembers his letter, abruptly, remembers that it's been years since anyone called him beautiful. "I love you," she says softly. "And anything you want is okay by me, or anything you don't want. But I want to see you shirtless, if you'll let me look."

“I- alright,” Charles smiles at her, and she wouldn’t have believed that he could smile shyly if she weren’t looking at the evidence.

She smiles back, significantly less shyly. “Just look- scout’s honor. Uh, unless,”

“Donna,” he rolls his eyes fondly. “I told you once, my dear, that I would give you anything you asked for. That remains true.”

Donna laughs at herself, feeling her cheeks go pink. “As I remember it, as soon as you gave me that power I was… less than responsible with it.”

“I expected nothing else,” Charles says warmly in return, coming to the edge of the bed and tipping her chin up, bending to kiss her softly. “I don’t mind, Donna. I enjoy hearing what you want. I will always do my utmost to give it to you.”

“You want to know what I want, Chuck?” She smiles, using the unbuttoned shirt to pull him closer to her. “You. Always. Every bit of you. In any way you want.” She stresses the last you, just a little, and Charles smiles to hear it, blushing.

He kisses her again, unable to resist the draw of touching her, the phantom sensation that spreads through his chest when their lips meet. “Would it be too much to hope for the same in return?” He brushes his fingers down her cheek, meeting her eyes.

“Absolutely not,” Donna answers, tugging on the shirt again. “Very reasonable,” she says, and Charles leans down, letting her wrap her arms around his neck and kiss him. “Will you sleep like this?”

“May I brush my teeth first?”

“Hmmm.” Donna lets go, flinging her arms back and flopping messily back on the bed. “I _suppose_ ,”

Charles makes her a silly little bow. “Thank you, oh wise and gracious queen of my heart,”

“One thing before you go, subject,” Donna raises her head, smiling. “Tell me you love me.”

“I love you.”

“Mean it?”

“More than anything.” And you make it so easy, he thinks but doesn’t say.

She smiles, pleased and quietly thrilled, lying back on the bed and stretching her arms above her head. “Good.”

“Ready?” Charles yawns as he stops beside the light switch, and Donna sits up to look at him.

She reaches out. “I wish I could look at you and sleep at the same time. You’re- you’re stunning, Charles.”

His eyes go over her, and Donna smiles, enjoying the warmth that sweeps through her. “You are incandescent, my angel, a light from heaven.”

“‘Love indeed is a light from heaven, a spark of that immortal fire with angels shared?’”

“Precisely.”

“Tell me I’m pretty,”

“You’re pretty.” Charles repeats dutifully, smiling softly at her. “Though the word hardly seems to do your radiance justice, Donna Marie, you could outshine Aphrodite,”

“Come here, please,” Donna holds her hands out. “I’m tired. I want to hold you.”

Switching off the light, Charles crosses the room and takes her hands. “That is the best idea I have heard all day. Possibly ever.”

“The best idea _ever_?” Donna repeats, smiling into the dark as her eyes adjust. “Wow. To Hell with Isaac Newton then, who needs gravity or the laws of motion, right?” She yawns.

“I can only say that I am bound in _your_ gravity my dear, and once our bodies are at rest together, I can affirm in the absolute strongest terms that I shall wish to remain at rest forever.”

She laughs softly, drawing him down for a kiss. “That was a long way of telling me you’re tired and you want to hold me too,”

“Perhaps you’ve conditioned me into long compliments, as they are invariably followed by- ‘short compliments,’” he kisses her again to illustrate the point.

“Come here, please. I really would just like to hold you, Chuck, I can’t believe I’m finally here with you.” And he deserves that story, why it took so long- but Donna can’t bring herself to tell it tonight. Nor any of the others.

When Charles crawls into bed, Donna curls herself to his chest, so content to simply touch, to exist at last in the same time and place. She loves how he feels in the dark, his hands stroking down her back. “I love you,” his voice is quiet.

“I love you too, Chuck,” Donna answers, curling closer. “You’re really something else,” she yawns, “this is perfect,” she rubs her face against his chest and promptly dozes off, secure in his arms. He murmurs something into her hair about Queen Mab, holds her tucked against him, so warm, and it’s not long at all before she’s asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> chapter title from Ilene Woods' So This is Love https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnxupEXxrTI
> 
> If you wanna know more about Sert or Braque would highly recommend! The first is an architect, the second a cubist painter, and they both have some pretty cool works out there
> 
> as for Les Huguenots, it's a Meyerbeer opera and the author personally loves grand opera but there are some highly valid criticisms and tbh the librettist for Les Huguenots... could have worked a little harder (sorry Scribe). https://youtu.be/sK0xbDR3ckU the duet referenced here is at 2:21:00 in this recording
> 
> last but not least: “‘Love indeed is a light from heaven, a spark of that immortal fire with angels shared’” it's a Byron quote babey


	5. It's Getting Better, Growing Stronger, Warm and Wilder

A few days pass, and Donna tries to settle into Boston, tries to accept the fact that being around Charles makes her feel like she’s _home_ , even if other things are… less than ideal, between her nightmares and his own, his parents, the stories she hasn’t told him rattling around her mind. They sound just like an unidentifiable loose piece on an army jeep in Korea.

She hasn’t snuck into his room again, since the first time culminated in a panicked dash through the hallway in the morning, but she hasn’t stopped _wanting_ to, despite the almost hilariously tense sprint of shame. Their ongoing quest to avoid Charles the second and his wife- who Donna privately thinks of as Madame de Winchester- has led them to drink wine in adirondack chairs on the far corner of the Winchester estate, staring into the trees- in full fall spectacle. Donna shivers when the wind picks up, and Charles wraps her in his cashmere sweater, smiling. “My dear, I thought Portland had cold winters.”

“It does,” Donna says, snuggling into the sweater, “But when it got really cold, we would go somewhere else. My mother is a great one for adventure- I’ve been to New Mexico, Arizona, California of course, Texas,”

“Ah,” Charles answers, looking at her. “And, uh, is there- a city, in Texas?”

Donna laughs and reaches over to kiss him. “Yes, dear, two at that. Austin and Houston- it’s alright. I liked Austin fine, the river is pretty. I like Oregon better, but Texas was certainly warmer.”

“And what is your favorite winter clime?”

She thinks for a moment, propping her face on her fist, elbow on the arm of the chair. The sleeves of Charles’ sweater hang over her hands, and the fabric smells like him- he’d mostly smelled like dirt, in Korea, as had they all, and discovering that he really smells like cedar and warm vanilla is fascinating. “Southern California, I think. It’s so different from Portland, and I don’t think I’d like it half so well if it weren’t so warm, but after months of rain and cold it’s nice to go somewhere that people are surfing in January and being outside isn’t an uphill battle.”

“I see,” Charles says, taking a sip of his wine. “Some winters, we’ve gone to Florida, but the _people_ are simply intolerable, ruin the weather completely,”

Donna smiles at that, reaching over to hold his hand. “I see. What’s your favorite place you’ve ever been?”

“Between Boston and Harvard,”

“ _No_ ,” She interrupts, chuckling. “I mean really _other_ , somewhere you’re not innately comfortable,”

Charles throws her an arch look. “A Winchester is naturally adaptable.”

Donna rolls her eyes. “It shouldn’t be so hard to get a simple answer out of you,”

“Tokyo.” Charles says it Toh-kyo, and Donna smiles.

“Why Tokyo?”

“Aside from meeting you? Kabuki, sushi, sake- it is a wonderful city, and quite different from the places I had experienced prior. Different, but not lesser.”

With a smile, Donna says, “I felt the same way about it. We actually have a lot of cherry blossoms in Portland- a lot of fruit trees generally- but seeing Tokyo was like living in a garden of earthly delights.”

“You are something of an Eve,” Charles agrees, trailing his hand down her face.

Donna smirks. “Getting you kicked out of the Garden?”

“Please. I think we all know that was the snake’s fault, though I couldn’t possibly comment on why a reptile was responsible for the fall of man. As a creation myth, it doesn’t make sense.”

“Are you critiquing the Bible? After all it’s done for us?”

Charles’ mouth pulls as he makes a dismissive sound in the back of his throat. “What exactly has it done for us?”

“‘I’ve had this thought about you before, when you visited and we lost one of our two precious days in the OR; wanting to stop time for you reminds me of the Bible. When God stopped the sun in the sky to give Joshua more time to defeat the Amorites; but now that I write it out and see the word on the page I simply read the part that says amor, and I think of my feelings for you- I don’t think I’d use the sun to defeat a people whose name makes me think of you.'”

Charles listens in a strange sort of happy shock as she quotes his own words back to him. “That was the letter you replied to with the sketch of a plucked chicken,”

Donna tips her head back and laughs. “What was I supposed to do, Chuck? You practically handed me a Diogenes joke, was I supposed to just not make one? Come on, what kind of girl do you think I am?”

“Mine, I’d rather hoped,”

“Well, that’s true,” Donna beams, leaning over to kiss him. “Want another glass of wine?”

“Please,” He holds out his glass, and she refills it. Drinking a rich red in the middle of the day seems indulgent, but then so does everything about him. He hasn’t even gone to work since she arrived, dismissing it with a shrug and a soft ‘you are more important.’ She hands back the glass, and he tells her, “You have an exceptional memory, my dear,”

Donna nods. “Thanks. Used to get me in trouble. Well, I’d get myself in trouble with it, quoting things back to people who didn’t like what they’d said- or that I’d read something.” She laughs to herself. “But on the other hand, comes in great for acting.”

“You enjoy acting?”

“Yeah.” Donna smiles softly, remembering. She takes a sip of her wine and tells him, “I was Viola in Twelfth Night, about two weeks before I left that stage for, shall we say, the Pacific theater. I told you, everywhere where I’m from has a community theater, a symphony, and suchlike. It was a wonderful time.”

Charles makes a soft sound of acknowledgement. “An actress, hm? I suppose I shall have to see you tread the boards at some point.”

“Don’t sound so excited about it,” Donna teases.

He rolls his eyes at her, taking her hand and bringing it to his lips. “My dear, of course I am excited, but I am also absorbing new information. There is still so much I don’t know about you. I find… I love you anyway. And more and more, each day.” His voice is soft, and he’s looking at her with something close to nerves, which makes Donna’s heart stutter.

She cups his cheek, leaning over to kiss him gently, resting their foreheads together. “Charles, it’s mutual. I love you.”

“I’m glad,”

“Tell me more about your traveling,” Donna takes the hand that isn’t holding his wine, playing with his fingers, tracing her nails across his palm. Somehow she just can’t get over how much bigger his hands are than hers. It’s a silly thing, but she loves it. Wouldn’t have guessed that having her hand wrapped in his would feel like the security blanket she never had. There’s a light freckle on the heel of his hand- she traces her first finger over it, again and again, wondering when she’ll know every detail of him.

He shakes his head. “My family is rather sedentary. Boston, Harvard, occasionally Florida or Los Angeles for a month in the winter- that was the limit of my experience prior to my posting overseas, other than a trip to New York or Philadelphia for a particular evening at the arts,”

“Oh,” Donna says, starting to feel her first two glasses of wine. “I’ve been all over. One time- when we were going through, oh, I don’t know where, but anyway;” she gestures flippantly. “My mother points up at this bridge and goes, ‘remember that sculptor you like? He did this one before the war.’ She meant the Second World War, not,” Donna gestures between the two of them. “I was- younger. So I was looking at this big mural, I guess it was from the Works Progress Administration-”

Charles shakes his head and takes a sip of his wine. “Using taxes to pay for finger-paintings on bridges. Biggest mistake of his Presidency,”

“ _What_?” Donna looks at him sharply.

“Donna?”

“Charles, did I just hear you say that FDR’s greatest mistake was _art_? The man signed an _internment order_.” The hand that was playing with his fingers stops as she stares at him, righteous in sudden tipsy outrage.

He blinks at her. “Ah- well, yes. I was- I was thinking of the economy, my dear, not-”

“Not people.” She finishes for him, fierce. “Are you ever thinking of people? No, sorry, of course you are. When they’re under your scalpel.”

She feels shame crawl up her throat as she watches the words hit home. “Donna,” his eyes are wide, and not in a way she wants to see. In a way that makes her worried that he might not be seeing her- that he might be seeing a metal table in Korea.

“Charles, I’m sorry, I didn’t-” She breaks off. “I’m sorry, Charles, I’m sorry.” Her hand is tight on his, eyes fixed on his face. “I’m sorry. Sometimes I speak before I think- words just- I talk too fast, I’m sorry, that was- inexcusable.”

With a sharp breath, he refocuses, blinking. “I- I ought to be shouting at you,”

“Yes,” Donna agrees. “I’m sorry, really,”

Charles cuts her off with a gesture. “No, my dear, I- but I suppose you don’t know this about me,” he looks down at their joined hands, turning his to hold hers back. “I… tend to get rather defensive, when- something like that- I’ve been known to shout for hours about trivial things.”

“Hawkeye told me.” Donna says quietly. “He wrote me a letter, once-” she sees his expression. “No, no, darling, it was _nice_. He really cares about you, you know. It was just a bad week, and he watched you lose it at a nurse who didn’t move fast enough and… I think he wanted me to know that you always calmed down, apologized. That’s really what the letter was about, not to let you scare me off the first time you shouted at someone about anything that didn’t matter.” She gets up, settling herself in his lap, and his hand goes around her waist as he looks at her. “I wouldn’t, you know. I’d shout back at you.Why... why aren’t you shouting now?”

“I don’t know.” Charles answers, brow furrowed. “I- I don't think I've ever let a comment like that pass. But- please don’t mistake me, my dear, I don’t _want_ to shout at you. If I can help it, I _will_ never shout at you.”

“Of course,” Donna acknowledges. “I’m sorry for what I said,” She tells him, cupping his jaw. “I really… I don’t think that about you, Charles. In the same letter, Hawkeye told me about the baby- the baby girl you all tried to take care of, how you almost broke that U.N. guy’s nose over her. I think he was trying to be funny about your temper, but he was telling me that you care, too.”

“Pierce and his damn letters,” Charles grumbles, hand squeezing her hip gently. “He thinks his nose belongs in the personal affairs of everyone he’s ever been within a hundred feet of.” He takes a deep breath and meets her eyes. “You were right. I wasn’t- I wasn’t thinking of people. I apologize. FDR obviously did far worse things than abuse funds.”

Donna leans into him, curling up, and tucks her head under his chin. “I’m gonna make you think of people more, Chuck. People can be wonderful.”

“Hm,” he makes a doubtful sound, and she swats his chest. “You are an exception, my dear,”

She rolls her eyes. “That’s the thing. I’m not. If you gave people a chance, you’d be surprised. I mean, look at the people in your life- Honoria, Hawkeye, BJ. Are you telling me they aren’t wonderful people?”

“Donna,” his sigh is long-suffering. “When one has shared a tent with Pierce and Hunnicutt in combination, one is rather divested of rose-colored glasses,”

“Tell me you had on rose-colored glasses before them, I dare you.” She kisses under his jaw.

He tucks his chin to kiss her properly on the mouth. “No. I suppose I didn’t. Very well, my dear, I shall try things your way.”

She fakes a gasp. “A doctor, caring about people. It’ll revolutionize the field,”

“Oh, hush.” Charles rolls his eyes, arms tightening around her. “Donna. Thank you, really. I… I don’t spend enough time… Well, I can be quite- inconsiderate.”

“And I have a running competition with myself to see how many feet I can put in my mouth at once.” Donna shrugs, then laughs at Charles’ expression. “Oh, come on, Chuck, you know that expression. Put your foot in your mouth.” She kisses him gently. “No one is perfect. Why should we be exceptions?”

Charles gives her a light kiss in return, tipping her jaw up. “But, my dear, you _are_ exceptional.”

“I’m not. And I’m sorry. I- well, I’m impulsive. You know that. I don’t really think that about you, I would never- I know you think of others, Charles, I’m sorry. And sometimes I don’t-”

“Hush,” he holds her close. “I forgive you, my love. Do you forgive me?”

“Yes,” Donna says, wrapping her arm around his shoulders, holding him back. “Hold me to a higher standard, will you, Chuck? I- I need to learn to hold my tongue sometimes,”

He shrugs. “One of my favorite things about you, Donna, is your willingness to say what you believe, consequences be damned.”

She blushes. “Maybe- sometimes- I could say it a little softer,”

“Perhaps,” he allows. “But I prefer you say what you think with hard edges than you not say it at all.”

“Thanks, Chuck,” Donna leans into him. “I want you to do the same. I never- want you to feel like you can’t talk to me.” She’s pulling him closer to her, thinking about the times she’s been told to be ladylike, to be quiet, to trim off her rough edges. It makes her think of the things she’s been waiting to say, been needing to say. How she rifles through memories like paperbacks in a used book store, looking for the right one for the moment. “While we’re having hard conversations, uh. Have I- I’d like to tell you what I was doing. When I got back, before I came here. If you don’t mind listening.”

His soft intake of breath sounds almost pained, but perhaps Donna is projecting, putting tracing paper over his emotions to draw hers. “I… would very much like to know,” Charles’ voice is soft in her ear, hesitant in a way she hasn’t heard it before.

She clears her throat and sits up, collecting her glass of wine and handing Charles his. “I did a lot of walking, the first few days. Especially- my first Monday, because I had nothing to do and my mother went to the Women’s Institute, and I… I found my old camera. Took some shots of my sisters, our house. And then I wandered around all day, with that camera. I was trying to find things to take pictures of, things I'd missed or things that reminded me of the people I wanted to send photos to. Alice and the other girls I worked with, some of the soldiers I got close to at the hospital, and you. I got some okay shots of the mansion and a couple good ones of the ferns around Washington park. But the things I really missed were the mountains, the green- and that's postcard stuff. It didn't seem right to just send you a postcard to tell you that I missed you and I wished that you were there. And besides, I spent the whole day walking. Went around the whole city,"

She gestures broadly, encompassing the East and West ends, the North and South sides of the river. "They must have wondered what the hell I was doing, over in the industrial district with my skirt and my camera. But by the end of the day, I didn't feel any better." She puts her face in her hand. "It was like I wasn't ready to be home. Can you imagine that? All that time, and I get home and I'm not ready. So I asked myself if that's really what it was, if that's really why I was still unhappy. Took a beer to riverfront park and stared at the Willamette. Spent a while working on projects, trying to reconnect with people. I couldn't do it, it was like they looked around the city and saw its problems and didn't care about anything, and I was too much, and I cared about everything. And the only answer I could come up with is that the city wasn't enough anymore. I was right, in my letter. I didn't fit. I didn't- I couldn't take any pieces of myself off.” She stops, taking a sip of her wine, staring into the glass for a moment.

“So I went to San Francisco to stay with my friends. I thought maybe a bigger city, still with some people who knew me... I had a couple of wild nights. It was a good month. Helped me figure some other things out, answer some questions about myself. But it didn't fix the missing. And I finally had to face up to it- I've never been the kind to miss someone like this, Chuck, and I always knew I would come see you but I didn't realize how badly I needed to do that until my friend asked what I was hoping for." She laughs tiredly, taking a drink. "I think hope for so long was for material things- soap, bandages, peace; I'd forgotten how to ask myself what I hoped for. For me. Beyond safety and a roof that didn’t get shelled. And when I did ask myself I found out that I didn't just want to _see_ you, come sit in some cafe and hear about Boston General and laugh about the funny shapes a human soul can get into under pressure- shapes that wear lampshades and get married at wild parties. I wanted more than that, to- I wanted exactly what you gave me when you first saw me. I wanted to see you smile at me like that again, I wanted to hear you say you loved me. And I wanted to tell you I loved you, too."

Charles has listened patiently, his arm still around her, thumb stroking softly at her hip. His other hand holds hers, so tightly she thinks her circulation might be impaired, and she stares at how large his hands are while she talks, in awe and in love as well as in pain. When she's finished, he clears his throat. "And... now that you have what you hoped for. Is it satisfactory?"

“More than,” Donna leans back to trace her fingers down his cheek, watches his eyes close as he leans into the touch. “I- I didn’t think it would be so nice. To be loved. To be loved all the time, I mean, not just- at convenience. I’ve had relationships like that, where I fill one niche, where I’m funny or kind or sweet, and as soon as I’m more than that I’m too much. I’m glad you don’t mind that I’m too much.”

Charles holds her tightly to his chest, burying his nose in her hair. “I love how _much_ you are, Donna Marie. If you were any less, I’d- I’d not love you half so well as I do, if you were any less than you are. You’re perfect.” 

Donna smiles.

“Thank you for telling me,” Charles’ voice is quiet.

“Thank you for listening.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title from Leonard Nimoy's It's Getting Better https://youtu.be/v7NXlrcGTGY


	6. Let Us Never Lose the Lessons We Have Learned

Donna has been volunteering shifts at the Boston Red Cross clinic, to get out of the house and live in the world. Most times, her shifts line up with Charles’ time at the hospital, but today she arrives back at the Winchester residence- making accidental eye-contact with Mrs. Winchester as the elderly socialite leaves, being chauffeured to some function or other- and finds Charles in his study, reading a letter. “Hello, love,” Donna greets, kicking off her shoes and settling cross-legged on the chair beside the window. “What do you have there?”

“Hawkeye,” Charles looks up from the paper on his desk, smoothing his hand over it as though that will make it more real. “He- he’s asking me to be a partner. At his clinic.”

Donna blinks. “Oh,” she says, unsure if she should follow the acknowledgement with disbelief or congratulations.

Charles looks back at the letter, re-reading, and his mouth curves into a soft smile. “He’s actually complimented my surgical ability; he must be quite invested in my acquiescence.”

“And will you? It’s in Maine, right?”

Nodding, Charles answers, “Crabapple Cove.” His mouth does something funny around the name, accustomed to a sneer that it’s there anymore. “I… might. It would be a part-time engagement. About a three-hour drive. A few times a month.”

Donna thinks about that- she can tell that Boston has been stifling, between the Winchester family and the Winchester reputation, not to mention the old memories and new stressors. “I think… that would be good for you.”

“Have you ever been to Maine?” Charles asks, looking up at her.

Shaking her head, Donna answers, “No, but I hear Portland Maine is almost as good as Portland Oregon,”

He smiles. “I doubt many residents of either location would appreciate that sentence, my dear,”

She chuckles. “Probably not. Tell me more about maybe being a partner.”

His hand smooths over the paper again, and Donna’s eyes follow the motion- his hands are so large, gentle and deft, and she finds herself watching his smallest gestures. She wonders which mannerisms of hers he’s noticed the most. But then, nearly every time she looks up at him it’s to find him watching her. “Pierce is intending to spend more time at Stinson Beach- in California. He would like someone- me- to take a part-time position at his clinic, which between himself, his father, and I would continue to function as usual.”

“Do you think you’d like that?”

Charles leans back in his chair, looking out the window pensively. The trees are losing their foliage, but it’s still brilliant. “I… think I would. I have been sleeping much more soundly, since your arrival, but there are still nights- sometimes in the morning I am so on edge that the noise of the city around the hospital is nearly intolerable,” something pulls in his face as he confesses it, and the expression tugs at Donna’s heart. She can’t say she doesn’t understand, but she never slept at the aid stations he’s told her about, or operated in the dark, and she can see how those things and everything like them would leave scars. “And I confess that the social environment of Boston has become somewhat… cloying. I don’t want to leave permanently, you understand, but a trip to Maine every so often could be just the thing. Particularly if I can manage to schedule so that I don’t miss too many nights at the opera.”

Donna smiles. “And the ballet,” she reminds him. They’d gone to see Jeux, Charles complaining quietly about Nijinsky’s avant-garde choreography, which had clearly influenced the choreographer of this rendition. Donna had spent a majority of her time enjoying the DeBussy and inching her fingers up Charles’ wrist in the dark, feeling his hand tremble on their shared armrest, alone in his private box.

“Ah, yes, the ballet.” The way he looks at her makes her certain that he’s thinking of the same things, and she uncurls herself from the chair to come press a light kiss to his lips.

His hand tangles in her hair, and she smiles against his mouth, kissing him more deeply. “So you’re going to say yes?”

“Hm?”

Smiling, she clarifies, “To Maine.”

“Ah- I- haven’t decided. I think I ought to talk to Pierce.”

Donna gestures to the phone on the wall. “I bet he’s finishing up by now. Do you have his number?”

“He included it in this letter, as a matter of fact,”

“Smart man,”

Charles shrugs. “More than I often gave him credit for, at any rate,”

“I bet he’d love to hear you say that.”

“Perhaps,” Charles rises. “Depending upon the quality of this conversation, I may yet tell him.”

Donna laughs. “I’m glad you don’t withhold compliments from _me_ , Chuck,”

“ _You_ are deserving of them. Without question.”

She rolls her eyes. “You’re lucky I love you,”

“Yes,” he acknowledges, lifting the receiver. It’s a short matter to get connected to Crabapple Cove, and Donna watches his face as Hawkeye answers, the flicker of a smile that passes. “Pierce,”

She can hear Hawkeye’s answering shout from feet away, and Charles cringes, holding the receiver away from his ear. “Yes, yes, hello, please restrain yourself,”

“How are you?” Pierce asks, and Charles smiles over at Donna.

“Quite well,” he answers. “Donna says hello.”

Again, Hawkeye is loud enough to be heard without a phone. “Hi Donna!”

She laughs, and Charles holds the phone to his ear. “Pierce, I received your letter,”

“You must have, or you wouldn’t be calling. I just want you to know, I don’t usually give out my number to strange doctors I’ve only lived with for years.”

“Pierce. I was curious- might I visit Crabapple Cove, to tour the clinic in person?”

“Yes, yes, Charles, please- you’re always welcome.”

That gives him pause. “I- thank you, Pierce.”

“How would, oh, not this weekend but the one after- how would that work?”

“Yes, that would do nicely,” Charles says, writing in his date calendar. “I look forward to it.”

“Do you?” Hawk laughs. “BJ says he might visit, too, want me to invite him on the same weekend? Swamp rat reunion,”

Charles chuckles. “I leave that to your discretion. However, talking of the madcap members of the 4077; Honoria got me Margaret’s address, would you like it?”

“Please! At least _one_ Winchester is competent,” Pierce sounds fond, when he says it, which could be the distance of the phone line.

Charles laughs anyway. “Indeed. By the by,” he clears his throat, conscious of Donna watching him closely. “You wouldn’t happen to have Sidney Freedman’s contact information,”

“I do,” Hawkeye says simply, for which Charles is grateful, and he writes quickly as the other surgeon recites it.

“Thank you. And- one more thing, Pierce,”

“Yes, Charles?” He can almost hear the eye-roll, but again it sounds fond rather than long-suffering.

“I read your signature with great interest- do you _really_ go by Benjamin Franklin, my friend?”

“Your _friend_?” Hawkeye sounds delighted. Charles hangs up on him, turning away from the phone with a smile.

“Does he?” Donna asks.

Charles shrugs. “I haven’t the faintest idea.”

“And he didn’t earn his compliment.”

“Well, perhaps next time,” Charles smiles. He sets down his date book, puts his hands in his pockets and looks out the window, taking a deep breath. When he lets it out, Donna could swear that she sees his tension leave with it. It feels as though she just watched him turn a corner, or see a sunrise.

“Hey, Chuck?”

“Hm?”

“I love you more than absolutely anything,”

He turns to smile at her. “The feeling is mutual, Donna Marie. I adore you. You are-”

“No long compliments,” she laughs, standing and coming to wrap her arms around him, stretching on her toes to set her chin on his shoulder and look out the window with him. “Will it get cold enough to go ice skating?”

His hands come to rest over hers, where they sit at his waist. “Yes. Would you like to go?”

“I would.”

Hand squeezing hers gently, he says, “you’ll need some winter clothes, my dear, what you brought is hardly warm enough if you intend to stay long enough to ice skate.”

“I’ll stay as long as you’ll have me,” Donna says, almost surprised to realize she still means it, can’t think of anywhere she would rather be than right there, right then, with him. There are still conversations they need to have, things she needs to say to him- things she’s afraid to say to him. Some part of her knows that she’s holding back on purpose, so she’s not at risk, so she doesn’t feel like she ruined _this_. But that same part of her is the part that wants to tell him everything, to write him an autobiography and make her life a present to be read and kept, hopefully treasured, given a place of honor on his shelves. She’ll tell him everything someday.

Charles turns his face to kiss the side of her head. “Bold of you to promise forever, my dear,”

“You know me, Chuck. I’m nothing if not bold.”

He huffs a laugh, hands stroking hers softly. “That’s very true, my dear.”

It’s mostly true- she opens her mouth to say something serious, but what comes out instead is, “Do you ice skate, my dearest Cuddles?”

“ _No_.”

“Maybe I can convince you.”

“I doubt it,”

“Ah, you should never doubt me. The power of a Donna with her mind set on something is legendary. Besides, I know your weakness,” She teases, turning her head to press kisses along his jaw, below his ear. Sure enough, he shakes almost imperceptibly in her arms, and she hugs him to her.

He leans into the touch slightly, tilting his head so she has better access, still staring out the window. “I will never doubt again,”

“Mm, I have made a new man,” She quotes his letter, the one she replied to with the Diogenes joke, and he groans.

“ _Donna_ ,”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title from Teo Torriatte by Queen https://youtu.be/Ge18n2JCwBs


	7. Lost Control and Tumbled Overboard Gladly

Margaret is there ostensibly to help set Donna up as a full-fledged staffer of the local Red Cross; her war record was lost somewhere over the Pacific (or the States) and the recommendation of Lieutenant Colonel Houlihan goes a long way, even stateside. Charles is grateful, even though he doesn’t completely understand why Donna wants to work when between the two of them they could walk out of their offices and never need to look back. Then he sees her, sitting with Margaret, talking about all the things the Red Cross can do that might begin to help undo the damage wrought by the war, and he begins to see. Perhaps it’s something like the reason that he can’t just walk away from a city of people who could benefit from his treatment, from his help. Something like the reason he’s going to be driving the few hours up the coast to see a certain B.F. Pierce and inquire about the details of running a small-town practice, integrated with the populace he cares for.

He’s surprised out of his reverie, staring at Margaret and Donna, when Honoria joins them. Of course he’d informed his parents and sister that they’d have company, but evidently Honoria was caught by surprise as she entered the sitting room, because she stopped in the doorway and said, almost breathlessly, “H-hello,”

“Well, hello,” Margaret stands to shake hands, and Charles recognizes that dip in her voice, the way her eyes move- it happened to him once, and to a fair few generals or colonels within his line of sight. To see it directed toward his _sister_ , however- he’s bristling to shout when Donna catches his eye, giving him a stern expression. Charles rolls his eyes in return.

“Margaret,” he says, emphasizing the first half of her name. “This is _my sister_ , Honoria. Honoria, Lieutenant Colonel Margaret Houlihan, the Head Nurse from the MASH unit.”

Honoria hasn’t let go of Margaret’s hand. Charles is tempted to slap their hands apart. “Ch-Charmed,” Honoria grins, and when he sees her expression he sighs heavily and goes to sit beside Donna. If this is his fate, he might as well meet it with grace and beauty at his side.

“It’s wonderful to finally meet you,” Margaret is using her ‘I just found out you’re a war hero with a higher rank than mine,’ voice, and Charles can’t stop himself rolling his eyes again. “I’ve heard so much about you,”

“L-l-likewise. N-none of it good, I h-hope?” Honoria gives her a saucy wink, and Charles feels part of himself die.

“Please, stop. Not while I am sitting _right here_ , Honoria, please,”

She sticks her tongue out at him, a habit that used to make him wince and look around for anyone else who might see. “ _I_ have to p-p-put up with _you_ ,”

That makes Margaret laugh, and Honoria looks back at her with a smile. “I hope he’s more popular at home than he was in Korea,”

“Depends on the day,” Donna puts in, and Charles looks at her, eyebrows rising. She shoulders him. “Just kidding, darling,”

“Are you?” Honoria laughs, gesturing Margaret back to her seat.

Charles looks around at the three of them with a slight sigh. “Depends on the day,” he says, and Donna barks a laugh.

Honoria is looking at him like he should have caught on to something ages ago, like she used to when she was halfway through a lie to their parents and he walked in unaware, so he turns to Donna and says, “My dear, I should like to take you to Martha’s Vineyard.”

“Now?” Donna looks up, surprised.

Charles shrugs. “Why not? The drive ought to take about three hours, and today we have, as they say, all the time in the world. If you and Margaret are finished.”

Smiling, she answers, “Oh, yes. I’ll get my coat. If you don’t mind playing hostess, Honoria.”

“N-not at _all_ ,”

Charles offers a nod to Margaret and a cutting look to Honoria, and goes to wait for Donna. He meets her at the bottom of the stairs, a perfect inverse of the night she arrived, and he picks her up to spin her, beaming at her as she giggles. “You were right, you know. In your letter. You meant just in Korea, but I believe the principle transcends space. ‘All we really have is moments,’” he quotes. “‘And the moments with you are the best ones,’” touching their noses, he spins again, smiling, and Donna grins back, her chest tight as her hands hold on for dear life.

“Chuck, you romantic,”

“Not so loud,” he says, and sets her down, kissing her gently. “You’ll ruin my reputation,”

“I think I’ve already done that,”

He grins. “Perhaps you have. Shall we make it irreparable?”

“You just want to get me alone,” she teases as they climb into the car, and Charles starts it. “Uh, Chuck- no offense- do you know how to drive?”

Scoffing, he pulls out of the driveway. “Yes, my dear, I do. If I hadn’t, Korea with its jeeps and ambulances would have provided me ample opportunity."

“Ambulances?”

He’s uncharacteristically quiet.

“We don’t… have to talk about it, if you don’t want to, but-”

“I stole an ambulance,” he says quietly. “And drove it to an aid station close to the front.”

Donna stares at him. “Oh.”

“I… I… don’t think I can explain.”

Sighing heavily, Donna stares out the window. “Yeah. I think there’re a lot of things about war that no one can explain. I can’t explain half the things I did there, but it doesn’t mean I didn’t need to do them at the time, like letting pressure off something you didn’t know pressure had built behind. And if you didn’t do enough in time… it was like the Titanic. Trying to turn with too small a rudder,”

“Sometimes I felt my rudder chain had come entirely disconnected,” Charles confesses, and Donna sets her hand on his knee.

“Have you got it hooked back up?”

Charles shrugs, looking over his shoulder to check traffic, and Donna is struck by how _big_ he is, literally larger than life, like an Olympian. He doesn’t fit in the driver's seat of the Bentley, his long legs jammed under the steering wheel, which looks comically small in his hands. The top of his head nearly brushes the roof of the car. He stands out like a cutout, an Ideal Man in a thoroughly fallen world. Like he doesn’t quite fit in the city, and she wonders if he feels it, if he feels out of place here the way she did in Portland. “I’m not sure I want it reattached.”

A beat. “Oh, the rudder chain. What do you mean?”

“I… I’m not precisely certain. I feel as though _I_ am the rudder, and someone else is pulling the chain, turning me this way and that, and I… would rather know what it is to feel the wind than the hand of man.”

Donna refrains from the obvious hand of man joke, and pats herself on the back for being a stand-up lady. “I guess that sort of makes sense, Charles, but don’t- don’t just give in to the wind. You can control the chain yourself, too. Go where _you_ want to go,”

He’s quiet.

“Do you know where that might be?” She asks softly, stroking his knee with her thumb.

It must cost him a lot to say, “no,” but as a Winchester he can afford it. Then again, perhaps that makes the cost higher, and Donna leans across the space between them, resting her head on his shoulder, sliding her hand softly over his belly to wrap around his waist, hugging him as tightly as she can while he’s driving- trying to merge, specifically.

“That’s alright, Charles. You can- you have _time_. And if you want help, I’m here. If there’s anything I can do,”

He chuckles softly, accelerating onto the highway. “Donna Marie, you are the North Star, and without you I wouldn’t even believe that, to continue a rather absurd metaphor, my boat _had_ a rudder. You’re the only light I could even begin to steer by.”

“That’s sweet, Charles.” She tips her head up to kiss under his ear. “But I don’t want to be your guiding light. I want to go on the voyage with you.”

Taking one hand off the steering wheel to wrap his long arm around her, Charles says, “I hadn’t thought of it that way, my dear. You’re right, of course. I’d much rather have your company. Tell me, how does one go about catching a star?”

“A fallen star,”

“I shall put you in my pocket and use your light on rainy days,”

“That’s very whimsical of you, Charles,”

He shrugs. “You give me… freedom, my dear, to be who I- who I am. I used to think Honoria had gotten all of the whimsy, all of the chaos, but I don’t believe that I was… allowing myself to be anyone but who I was expected to be.”

“And you are now?”

The car is quiet for a long time before Charles says, “I’m trying to. I- think you’d be quite bored with the alternative. I doubt you’d have looked twice at the man I was before the war.”

Donna shakes her head. “There’s no knowing now, Chuck, but for the record I love you just how you are- and I always have, from the first night we met. You don’t have to change, or try to be anything at all except who you want to be, who you are.”

“You are too kind to me,”

“No, just kind enough.”

Hours later, by the sea, she leans on his chest, her hands on the railing in front of her. “It’s beautiful,”

“Not as beautiful as you are,”

Laughing, she turns to him. “I was supposed to say that to you. And we were supposed to be looking at Portland, maybe with a sunset.”

He bends to kiss her fondly. “We can do that, as well, Donna. If it pleases you. We can do anything you like.”

“What are you thinking about?”

“Would it sound utterly trite to say the Ode to Joy?”

She smiles, bright. “No, but only because I know that’s not the only piece you know,”

He shudders. “God forbid.”

They stare out at the waves. Donna thinks of the letter he wrote her, the time he was tossed in the waves. “Are we near the spot you and Honoria were playing, when-”

Charles points up the coast. “Perhaps a twenty minute walk in that direction.” He clears his throat, and his voice is softer when he speaks again. “Donna… I still think of you that way. I- I realize you have spent a significant amount of time with me, now, and if you are… disappointed by my life, my habits, I will understand, but I still think of you like the sea. The tempest, the calm, the beauty, and the danger. You are a force of nature, Donna Marie, and I adore you.”

“Oh, Charles,” she turns into his chest, tipping her face up to kiss below his jaw. “I adore you. How I feel about you- it hasn’t changed. I’ve learned so much about you, and I know you’ve learned about me, too, and- I appreciate seeing you every day, more than anything. I honestly have thanked God that I get to, that we’re safe, that _you’re_ safe, and we have so much time that we can talk about forevers,”

He hums, gathering her close. “Donna,”

“Charles, we have our whole lives to get bored of each other. Don’t try to rush it, alright? I love you, and I’m not bored of you yet- and I don’t honestly think I ever will be. You’re wonderful.”

“As are you,” he tells her. “Beyond anything I could have hoped for, my angel, in my wildest dreams.”

She rises on her toes to kiss him, shivering when a gust of wind buffets them from the sea, and Charles rubs his hands briskly up and down her arms. “Would you like to leave?”

“It seems silly just to stare at the ocean for twenty minutes and go,”

“It’s cold,” Charles says. “And I haven’t driven you around all the places I’d like to show you, yet.”

Donna smiles. “Well then, lead on,”

He holds the car door for her, handing her in, and they drive, Charles pointing out particular places he has fond memories, telling stories about Honoria. Donna settles in, listening, telling him stories about growing up with three sisters, the things that Honoria has done that remind her of her next oldest sister. At a small cafe, he buys her hot cocoa, and she smiles.

They begin the drive back with the radio on, and Donna sings along softly to Doris Day and Eddie Fisher.

She reaches to turn down the dial. “You’re not really mad that Honoria likes Margaret, are you?”

“It’s perfect, actually,” Charles tells her with a heavy sigh. “Margaret won’t leave the army, but she’ll have someone waiting at home. Someone to come back to.”

“Look at you, skipping ahead to the end of the story. Tell me, Chuck, do you read the last pages of novels first?”

He ignores her digs. “I couldn’t have planned it better myself. Honoria will not have to avoid constant scrutiny; she will simply be something of an eccentric who occasionally plays gracious hostess to an army friend of her older brother’s. And in society, _eccentricities_ are acceptable; _deviancy_ is not,” he sighs heavily. "And I shall simply have to live with the fact that it's _Margaret_."

“I hate rules,” Donna answers, looking out the window at the Atlantic.

Charles reaches over, slipping his hand in hers. “These ones we can bend,”

“To the point of breaking,” She wonders if they're talking about the same thing. She thinks so- it's called a 'Boston Marriage' for a reason, after all, and there's no reason to think he doesn't _know_ about Margaret. This would be the moment, Donna knows, to bring up her own past, her time in San Francisco; but it feels wrong, like an intrusion. She doesn't know how to tell him that before she came to Boston she spent time learning who she was with friends of friends whose blue eyes made her think of him.

He smiles. “Precisely.”

Donna sighs heavily. “Let’s get drunk tonight.”

Charles looks sideways at her. “My dear,”

“I just want to be irresponsible. For a bit. With you and Honoria- and Margaret if she’s still here. Just… let go. And probably put myself to proper sleep, make it through a night. You know?”

“I suppose I do, at that.”

By the time they arrive home, Margaret is gone, but Honoria is waltzing dreamily by herself in the music room, and Donna sneaks a look at Charles, who is wearing a put-upon look. “Nori. You can’t name your children the first day you meet someone.”

She sticks her tongue out at him. “Y-you named yours the f-first _hour_ you’d met someone,”

Charles flushes crimson. Donna grins. “What are our childrens’ names, Chuck?”

Honoria laughs at her brother as he shakes his head, and Donna squeezes his hand tightly. “Honoria,” she says, “I was thinking- let’s get drunk tonight.”

Tilting her head as she regards Donna, Honoria says, “Alright. Wh-what are we d-d-drinking to?”

“True love,” Donna answers dramatically, and both of the Winchesters roll their eyes, smiles soft. “Oh, come on, it’s as good a reason as any.”

Charles wraps his arm around her waist, sweeping her into the hopping steps of a landler. “With you, it is,”

Donna laughs, thrilled- he’s ridiculous, sometimes, breaking down from his uptight facade, so honestly himself that she can’t help but smile, even if he could use some lessons in the landler.

Six hours later, the three of them are roaring drunk, clustered around one end of the dining table with empty bottles strewn down the length of it.

Charles is gesturing wildly. “And I said, ‘maybe we should wait and see if MacArthur shows up,’” He hears himself giggle, the high-pitched noise he’s fairly certain he can only make whilst intoxicated, and Donna’s smile gets soft, silly and love-struck. That expression is half-remembered, half-imagined, from a Tokyo ballroom. She and Honoria are listening, laughing, and Charles finds that he’s enjoying telling the stories, drunk enough to be separate from the memories, which are after all not very good ones.

“T-t-tell m-m-me one about M-Margaret,”

Charles suddenly can’t recall anything but the time he gave the Head Nurse food poisoning and feels himself turn bright red. “I- ah-”

“No, no, no, let me tell you the story of the night we met,” Donna is grinning, one hand on Charles’ knee as the other reaches to insistently tap the table in front of Honoria. “You’ll love it, you’ll love it,”

Charles puts his face in his hands and Donna tangles her feet with his as she talks, reaching over to shake his shoulder for emphasis more than once, finishing another drink as she goes.

“ _Charles_ ,” Honoria sounds proud of him, which is possibly more horrifying than the mere fact of forgetting the night. “Th-that’s better than the t-time you swam the r-river,” Donna laughs. “He was gonna try for the koi pond, but I- I stopped him,”

“And I have yet to conduct any more ill-advised intoxicated swims,”

“W-wait, Charles, th-the fountain,” Nori is giggling.

Charles smiles proudly. “Ah, well, we were sober for that, Nori, but-” he grins, looks at Donna with slightly unfocused eyes. “We ruined my dress uniform the day I got home,”

“The one you were wearing in Tokyo? But I liked it so much!” She leans over, hands wandering over him, petting his shoulders and down his chest. “You looked soooo pretty, Cuddles,”

Flushing bright red, Charles protests, “Donna,”

She stops petting him in favor of covering his mouth. “Shhh, Chuck, shhhh, I’m allowed to tell my boyfriend he’s pretty,”

“B-b-boyfriend,” Honoria cackles, doubling over. “G-get her your letterman j-jacket, _Cuddles_.” her voice is even louder than it usually is, and Donna is impressed by the sheer volume of alcohol it took to get her there.

“Shut up, Nori,” Charles is flushed, holding Donna’s hands. “We’re adults,”

Donna grins, “No. I don’t wanna be. Get me your- I wanna wear your letterman jacket. Let’s- let’s go steady, Chuck,”

He can’t help but smile at her, blinking drunkenly. “If you want,”

“Good,” she says smugly. “Where- can we go get it?”

Charles frowns, thinking hard. “It… I believe it’s in my closet. I wouldn’t know. I haven’t- haven’t worn it in _years_.”

Honoria is first up, tugging at his hand. “Come on, l-l-let’s go look,”

“Yeah,” Donna’s got his other hand, and Charles lets them haul him up, stumbling up the stairs with Donna under his arm, tucked close to his side with one of her arms wrapped around his waist, her other hand on his stomach, leaning heavily on him, and they giggle as they navigate the stairs, both staring at their feet.

“Shhh, shhh,” Charles presses his hand to his lips. “Mother- and dad,”

Honoria laughs, jumps up the next step, and the one after that, stumbling slightly.

“Nori, no, Nori, shhhh, careful,”

In his haste to try and catch Honoria, Charles lets go of Donna, which he regrets when he reaches the landing and realizes she’s no longer beside him. “Chuck!”

“Donna, my angel, where- where did you go?” His vision blurs when he moves his head too quickly.

Honoria snorts. “Angel. W-we don’t even g-go to church.”

“Shut up, she’s- she’s-”

“Music room!”

The Winchester siblings look in. “Jacket’s not in h-here,”

“No, no, wait, wait,” Donna seats herself at the piano and clears her throat. “Heart and soul, heart and soul, I fell in love with you heart and soul,” She’s drunk, missing notes, but who cares when Charles is leaning heavily on the piano, staring at her with a soft smile.

Honoria throws herself on the couch like an ailing Victorian maiden, overcome by fresh air. “Stop,”

Donna grins, sings louder. “The way a fool would do- MADLY- because you held me tight,”

A pillow is flung her way with deadly aim. “Stop,” Honoria complains.

“Honoria!” Charles scolds. “Enough,”

His sister sticks her tongue out. “Then be q-quiet,”

“I’m allowed to have a little fun,” Donna slurs, flinging the pillow back at Honoria.

“Have fun q-quietly,” Honoria presses a hand to her head. “Ugh.”

Charles stops leaning on the piano and tries to cross the room. He quickly reels into the wall. “Hello,” he tells it.

“How did we- how did we get up the stairs,” Donna laughs, watching them. “Oh, god,”

“Bed,” Honoria snuggles her face into the couch. “Carry me.”

“No,” Charles tells her.

“Yes,”

“Fine,” he shambles to the sofa and tugs on her arm. “Ah. No.”

Honoria starts giggling and rolls off the sofa, lying on the floor. “Oh- I m-made you an ap-pointment.” She looks up at him, closing one eye and pointing dramatically.

“What?”

“Next w-week. With Sidney F-Freedman.”

Charles sits down beside his sister, groaning. “Nori.”

“You need it,”

“Fuck off,” he leans his head against the sofa, mouth open, and Honoria uses his thigh as a pillow. Donna looks at them for a moment, her vision blurry and her heart soft. She feels perfect. She doubts she’ll feel so good in the morning. But for the moment, the floor looks pretty appealing, especially with Charles available for use as a pillow. As she thinks it, he starts to snore, and Donna laughs, slipping off the piano bench and crawling over to lean her head on his shoulder, curled into his side, distantly marveling at how warm he is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter title and the song Donna is singing are both Heart and Soul, by the Four Aces  
> https://youtu.be/fXJfT8IjBQc


	8. How Could Anybody Have You and Lose You (and Not Lose Their Mind Too)

“Sidney Freedman,” he holds his hand out, and Donna shakes with a smile.

“Donna Parker. I’ve heard wonderful things,”

“Ah, someone’s been lying through their teeth,” Sidney laughs. “So, tell me, you’re here with Major Winchester?”

Donna looks up at Charles with a smile. “Love of my life,” She affirms, leaning in to kiss under his jaw as he blushes.

“Hm, must be serious. I’m glad you called me,” Sidney’s smile is slow, hands in his pockets, and Donna can’t help but laugh. “I’ll see what I can do for you, Ms. Parker, don’t worry.”

Charles clears his throat. “Hardly off to an auspicious start,”

“If they let me get off to auspicious starts, I might try good first impressions next, and that wouldn’t do at all,”

Nodding seriously, Donna answers, “No, of course, everyone knows a good shrink should come in like a lion and go out like a lamb,”

“Easier to ignore that way,” Sidney winks at her, then looks at Charles. “Well, Major, shall we?”

The two disappear into Charles’ study, and Donna paces, then sits beside Honoria. Waiting with her is better than waiting alone would be, Donna knows, but it’s still impossible not to start to her feet as soon as the door opens.

“Easy, Ms. Parker, the marathon doesn’t start for a half hour,” Sidney soothes, easy voice making her shoulders relax despite herself. “Nothing to worry about. Everything’s going to be fine,”

Aware that she’s probably far more nervous than she need be, Donna nods. Honoria sets a hand on her shoulder, and Charles comes out of the study with a pensive look. “Thank you, Sid,” he says, offering his hand, and Sidney shakes it with a smile.

“Any time, Charles, just call me.”

“I- I believe I very well might.”

“It’s a start,” Sidney says, setting his hat on over his tight curls. “Ladies,” he touches the brim. “And Ms. Parker, if your symptoms get any worse, you know; butterflies, dizziness, rose-colored glasses, you just go ahead and call me,” he’s looking over his shoulder as they descend the stairs, smiling good-naturedly at her.

She laughs. “Too late, Dr. Freedman, I’m afraid it’s past the point of no return,”

“Ah, well, in cases like that, it’s best to just love and cherish one another. Give that a try and call me in the morning. Or better yet, don’t.”

“I won’t.” Donna smiles, shaking his hand. “Thank you. Really.”

“See you soon,” he answers, and the front door closes.

Charles is standing with his hands in his pockets, looking at the door. “Hm. Well, Nori, you had better leave or you’ll be late,”

“Late?”

He smiles, smug. “Oh, dear, I must have forgotten to tell you- I made you an appointment as well. You have a three hour drive to make; you’re expected at West Point.”

Honoria’s eyebrows go up. “Why on Earth- oh, Ch-Charles, you d-didn’t,” she grins.

“Lieutenant Colonel Margaret Houlihan will be waiting to greet you,” Charles tells her, and Honoria practically sprints up the stairs.

“Thank you! I n-need shoes,” She runs back down mere moments later, pumps in her hand, and pauses for a bare second to kiss Charles on the cheek. “D-don’t think I’ll l-let you get out of t-t-talking about therapy, later,”

Rolling his eyes with a sigh, Charles says, “I am more than aware.”

“See you soon,” Honoria picks up her bag and opens the hall closet for a coat, stepping into her shoes and throwing the front door open. Snow swirls outside, not too deep but certainly chilly, and Donna is glad when the door closes again.

“Your idea of revenge is really something,” She says, looking at Charles.

“Oh, I am only just beginning. Excuse me, my dear, I have- I think I’d like to be alone, for an hour or two.”

Donna nods. “Alright. Are you- are you okay?”

“Yes, quite. Come and find me in an hour or so?” He kisses her cheek lightly.

“I love you,”

“I love you too,” Charles says, mounting the stairs, and Donna wanders down the hall to the library, grateful that Mrs. Winchester spends most days making social calls and Mr. Winchester rarely emerges from his study.

She spends the time reading Emily Dickinson, one eye on the clock, and at the hour mark gives it fifteen more minutes before she stands and replaces the book on the shelf. Becoming comfortable in the Winchester house has taken time, but Donna has finally stopped getting lost, stopped letting herself be flustered by Honoria popping out of seemingly random rooms that all turn out to be something intensive- a gymnasium, a music room, the particular room reserved for Honoria’s soirees where all the guests look like they’d be more comfortable in a dimly-lit jazz hall or smoking cigarettes in some Paris cafe. Still, when Charles’ sister is gone- visiting Margaret at West Point, of all things- the house seems bigger and more maze-like than ever. Perhaps it’s this that leads Donna to look for Charles down the hall where their bedrooms are, even though it’s the middle of the day on a Saturday and the love of her life is generally to be found in his study.

“Hey Chuck,” She stops in Honoria’s doorway when she hears the hummed strains of Wagner.

“Mm?” He looks up, wiping his forehead with the back of the hand that isn’t holding a tape measure.

Donna looks around the room. “What are you doing?”

Charles grins. “I am moving my sister’s furniture five inches to the left.”

“...why?”

He shrugs. “Why not? It will annoy her, and I have the time,”

“Can I help?”

“By all means, my dear,”

Donna smiles and comes to kneel beside him. “Have you moved the bed yet?”

“No,”

“Next project, then,”

“It will be much easier with your assistance.”

Eyeing the massive carved four-poster, Donna agrees. “Lucky I came along when I did, then,”

“You are constantly my saving grace,”

“Just call me angel,” Donna winks. “You know, Chuck, I missed the way you smile. The way your nose wrinkles.”

He looks at her and smiles deliberately, nose wrinkling, and she notices that the corners of his eyes crinkle too, so she reaches out to touch. “Donna?”

“Nothing. I just- you know how when I first got here you didn’t think I was real? I- you’re _so_ real, Charles, I’ve never met anyone who makes me feel so… so in the moment. I never feel like I’m hiding from you. Or like you’re hiding from me. I mean,” she gestures around the room. “We’re moving your sister’s furniture a few inches to the right. Just to-”

“Five inches to the left.”

She rolls her eyes, smiling. “Five inches to the left. Just to do it. Just because you exist here, in this moment, and I… love that about you. I love everything about you.”

He looks up from the measuring tape, expression soft. “Donna… my angel. You make me feel things I- I didn’t know were possible. I think I finally understand devotion to a higher power; the fear, the passion. You are divine, my dear.”

Donna blushes, leaning over for a gentle kiss. “Short compliments, Chuck,”

“Never.” He smiles softly against her mouth. “You deserve paeans, epics, and I shall deliver the closest approximation possible.”

“You’ll have to give me lots of kisses to counterbalance, then,”

“I believe that is an acceptable compromise,”

Donna grins and wraps her hand around the back of his neck, her fingertips stroking his curls lightly. “Kiss me,”

“Gladly,” It’s gentle, close-mouthed, but both of his hands are cupping her jaw as though her skull were that of St. Theodore, something so precious, so holy and irreplaceable that the mere handling warranted the holding of breath.

When their kiss breaks, Donna stares into his eyes, and it seems completely ridiculous that they’re kneeling on the floor of Honoria’s room, in the middle of moving her side-table. She grins. “Time and a place, Chuck. Anywhere and everywhere, with you. Do you wanna dance?”

He smiles at her, reaching up to run the backs of his fingers down her cheek. “Absolutely,”

“Let’s finish this,”

Laughing, he moves the table and stands, offering her a hand. “You are a marvel,”

They move the rest of Honoria’s furniture, and Donna looks around the room with a grin. “This is a great prank, Chuck. Come dance with me?”

“Yes,” he agrees, and takes her hand, leading her to the music room. Once there, he puts on a Four Aces record, and Donna steps close, ignoring the upbeat pace, holding his hand and resting her head on his chest. Charles gathers her close, arm around her waist, and she sighs happily, content in that moment in a way she hasn’t been in a long time. Maybe ever, as trite as it sounds. The song changes, something else that’s faster than she would have thought he liked, and Donna tries to picture Major Dr. Charles Emerson Winchester the third jitterbugging. She smiles, turning her face into his chest to hide it.

“Darling?” Donna looks up at Charles a moment later. “What happened to the Classical?”

Charles’ mouth turns down. “Is a man not allowed a variety of taste?”

“Variety _is_ the spice of life.”

“And you don’t think of me as spicy,”

Donna laughs. “Chuck, you’re not _bland_. Though no, I don’t think I would have chosen the word ‘spicy.’” She imitates his accent, to say it, and he smiles.

“I cannot believe you’re real, Donna Marie. After we met, when you visited the 4077, I thought you’d leave and your letters would stop.”

“But they didn’t,”

“No,” Charles holds her closer, his hand pressing at the small of her back. “I held you like a fixed point. Some days I- I orbited around you, trying to ignore the cold vacuum, acting as though you were my sun.” Donna smiles up at him as he speaks, the hand on his shoulder slipping down to rest on his chest, the hand he’s holding squeezing gently. “But when the letters did stop- I- a planet requires an orbit, my dear, or it begins to tilt off-course. And now- you’d- you’d take some time to adjust if the sun were dancing with you.”

“It is the East, hmm, Chuck?”

He smiles. “Something like that.” He picks her up and spins, completely out of time, and she shrieks with laughter. His cheeks are red when he sets her down again, and his eyes are bright.

Heart pounding and seized with the thrill of the moment, Donna says, “Let’s go to bed.”

“My dear?” Charles’ steps falter.

“Shush, Charles, I’d have thought you had a cleaner mind,” She swats his chest, laughing.

He pulls a chagrined face. “Perhaps before I was forced to live with Pierce, the only surgeon to find sterile gloves sexually appealing.”

Donna laughs. “Does he _really_?”

“I don’t know whether there is anything on Earth that is truly off the table where Pierce is concerned,” Charles answers with a sigh.

Donna shakes her head. “I’d really love to spend more time with him one day,”

“I’m sure you will, darling. Particularly if this Maine venture comes to fruition.” He spins her properly this time, under his arm and out, then draws her back to his chest. “What do you think of it, by the by?”

“I think it would be good for you.”

“Mm, so does Sidney. And Honoria. Though I suspect she just wants me to be the one embroiled in scandal, for a change.”

Donna chuckles. “That seems about right. But I think she wants it for you so you’re happy, too, you know.”

“I know.”

“You haven’t responded to my invitation,” Donna says. “Is it a no?”

“Invitation?”

“To bed. I want to go have breakfast in bed. I want you to read to me. I want to give you a one-woman rendition of Twelfth Night,”

He looks askance at her down his nose. “Breakfast? My dear, it’s nearly evening,”

“Backwards day,” she shrugs, grinning. “If you don’t want to go to bed, we can sit on the floor in the library.”

“No, no,” Charles pulls her closer. “I would like to. I am… confused.”

She laughs. “Me too. Come on, let’s make it happen- I can only make a few things, but I can make pancakes,”

“As can I,” He follows her out of the music room, down to the kitchen.

“You _can_?” She asks.

He flushes. “I- it’s a rather long story, my dear, but I can cook quite well. In fact, Max wanted my services as a column writer for a short-lived cooking section of the also short-lived 4077 periodical. He bungled it, of course, but it was the thought that counted.”

“You don’t sound like it was,”

Charles shrugs, opening cupboards. “It was simply another wartime escapade, my dear, it’s unimportant now.”

“But you can cook.”

He smiles. “Yes. Let me prove it.”

She smiles back. “What do you put in your pancakes?”

“Put in them? Aside from the obvious?”

“Yeah. I always put blueberries in mine.”

“Well, then, that shall be the order of the day. I made Honoria apple pancakes frequently when she was little. I believe I can manage blueberries,” He rummages in the icebox and comes out with a small box of blueberries, setting them on the counter.

Donna opens it and tries a few before she reaches over to run her hand over his shoulders as he turns to the stove. “Thank you,”

“Of course, my dear.” He answers. “Perhaps you could begin your rendition of Twelfth Night.”

“I’d love to.” She beams. “So, the scene, a ship- it’s sinking. So you know right off that things are pretty rough.”

Charles laughs. “My dear. I suspect you are not using your memory to its full capacity.”

“Fuck off, I skip the Orsino bit until later, this is my one-woman show.”

“The audience does not typically see the ship sinking,”

“Again, my show, my rules, the boat’s there. And it’s going down. Someone in the distance yells timber, and then we see three bedraggled sea-tossed figures straggle up the beach. Sorta like you after that time at the Vineyard you wrote me about,”

He shakes his head, mixing batter. “You paint a vivid scene, I’ll give you that,”

“Thank you,” She hops onto the counter and grins.

Donna continues her slightly altered version of Twelfth Night as Charles cooks, tasting blueberries and loving his laugh when her unexpected narrative detours catch him by surprise. She can’t remember ever being so content- and that said a lot, given the way her last weeks had gone. “This might be my favorite ever batch of blueberry pancakes,” She tells him as she carries a tray up the stairs, Charles following her. “And that is a _high_ compliment,”

“So noted,” He smiles. “So- we have pancakes, we are nearly through with Twelfth Night- what else would you like?”

“Pyjamas,” Donna nods authoritatively.

Charles smiles. “Very well, my dear. Do you think you can retrieve yours and return without being spotted?”

“A difficult challenge for some, but luckily I happen to be an expert spy.”

Charles thinks of Flagg in a trashcan and laughs. “My dear, not so loud, J. Edgar Hoover probably left some bugs last time my father invited him over.”

“Oh, god, I don’t even know where to begin with the list of things I hate about that sentence.”

They’re both laughing as she slips onto the landing, and Charles changes quickly, setting the tray on the bed and selecting a book from the small pile on his bedside table. “Did you want me to read to you, my dear?” He asks when she returns.

“I would like that. I’ll finish Twelfth Night fast for you,” she says, going into the bathroom. The night is perfect, but she feels uneasy- like it’s too perfect. Something is itching at the back of her mind, and she knows what it is, has been trying to ignore it.

“You look lovely,” Charles tells her when she comes out of the bathroom, in her sleep clothes.

She smiles. “Thank you,” picking up her plate, she settles onto the bed, sitting cross-legged. “What did you pick out to read?”

“Mm,” Charles has a mouthful of pancake, and he holds up the book.

Reaching to take it, Donna feels her expression soften. “ _A Tale of Two Cities_ , huh? Charles, I appreciate that you want to read me romantic things that Sidney Carton has to say, but the plot of the book isn’t exactly-”

“Dickens,” Charles interrupts her. “Charles Dickens.”

“Oh- _Oh_!” Donna laughs. “Wordy as Dickens. Darling, I love you,”

“I love you too, Donna Marie,” he says, and it makes her stomach swoop. She sighs, recognizing that the time has come to face her fears, to fix that unidentified something rattling around the jeep in her mind.

Donna sets her utensils down and moves her plate aside, hands twisting in her lap. “Charles- I want to tell you something. And I’m a little afraid of what you’ll think of me after I do.” She’s been screwing up her courage, even though she knows it’s going to be okay, knows he’s still going to love her.

He puts down his fork, moving his plate back to the tray and looking up at her with gentle eyes, waiting. He looks so beautiful, and Donna’s heart skips with worry that he’s never going to look at her like this again. “What is it, my dear?”

“One of the- one of the things that flew out of Pandora’s box while I was in Korea was- um,” it’s silly, it shouldn’t be so hard to tell him this, but it is- she knows he loves her, but the question of how far that love goes is still very much an open-ended one. It’s a risk, to say what she needs to say out loud, anywhere and to anyone. But to him- it would break her heart to see disgust in his eyes. She tells herself again that she isn’t going to, that if anyone will understand- “Sorry,” she takes a deep breath. “One of the things I learned about myself and- and gave some rein to, in Korea and then San Francisco was that I don’t just like men. I like… all kinds of people. In the- uh, biblically-knowing sense.” She knows Charles doesn’t like _any_ kinds of people in the biblically-knowing sense, has her suspicions about Pierce and Hunnicutt- but it feels different when it’s _her_. When she desperately wants him to love her for who she is, every misshapen piece that’s been ignored or rejected over the years.

Charles looks at her as though he’s waiting on as much of a precipice as she is.

“That’s… that’s all.” Donna’s hands twist in her lap. "I mean, I- you know- with some friends of friends in San Francisco, and that's part of why I didn't write, I didn't know how to tell you- Chuck, can you say something?"

He tilts his head, blinks. His mouth opens, closes again. She’s not sure he’s ever been rendered speechless, or ever will be again. As if looking at herself from the outside, Donna thinks this could be a moment for the history books- Charles Emerson Winchester iii, at a loss for words. It’s a shame she doesn’t have a camera. If she’s about to be left, it would be a good memento. “I find I… I don’t know where to begin.”

“Just- anywhere, just tell me what you’re thinking,” she’s nervous, and tacks on, “please,” after a pause during which he should have said something, anything.

He draws his feet in, propping his elbows on his knees and resting his fingers against his lips. “I am thinking first and foremost that you are going to tell me that having discovered you have twice the wide world of people to choose from who are not broken, you are not going to choose me. Who is. Who _is_ broken.”

Donna wants to laugh, but she’s too close to tears. “Chuck, who told you you were broken? You’re not, come here, you’re not broken,” she holds out her hands, kissing his when he gives them to her. “And I don’t _want_ anyone else. Not like this; I love you. I love you. You’re not broken. I’m happy with you just the way you are. I just wanted to tell you- the way I am.”

“Oh,”

“Chuck, I really, _really_ am, happy with you. Just the way you are. I don’t want you to be any different, and I _certainly_ don’t think you’re broken.” She looks down at their joined hands. “Do you… think I am?”

“No! Not in the slightest, my dear, certainly not.”

Donna smiles, leaning down to press a hiss to the back of his hand. “I can’t believe it- I- thank you, Chuck, you mean the world to me.”

Charles leans closer to capture her lips in the softest kiss she’s ever experienced. “I love you, Donna, exactly the way you are.”

“I love you too, Chuck, exactly the way you are,”

He smiles, and they’re silent for a moment before he cocks his head and tells her, “You know, Honoria doesn’t like men at all,”

“What?” Donna looks up, shocked. Then she thinks for a moment and begins to chuckle. “Actually, no, I’m not surprised. Well, no wonder you thought I was going somewhere past ‘I like everyone’ with that. No big news to you that people can be any which way but up, is it?”

Charles smiles slightly at her, pressing a kiss to her temple. “‘O Brave new world, that has such people in’t,’” he quotes, and Donna smiles.

“It’s not new to thee,”

“No,” Charles agrees. “But you are _such_ a person, my dear. ‘Of the very instant that I saw you did my heart fly at your service,’”

She leans into him to kiss under his jaw. “How would you know? You don’t remember the instant you saw me,”

“I can extrapolate,”

“Based on what available data?”

He tips her chin up. “I am in the process of gathering that,” he says, and kisses her. “The way I feel about you, Donna- it grows exponentially brighter, like Dante’s circles of Heaven. Soon I shall be blinded, I am sure.”

“I promise I won’t leave you when we reach the highest circle,” she teases, kissing his nose.

Charles chuckles under his breath. “Oh, good. I rather rely on you to be my guide through the holier moments,”

“May I show you a holy moment or two, Chuck?”

“May I finish my pancakes first?”

Donna smiles. “I think that’s how most holy moments start, isn’t it? Blueberry pancakes?”

“I wouldn’t know. I haven’t had the pleasure of blueberry pancakes before today,”

“Glad I could introduce you to the food of the gods,”

He smiles at her. “Food of the angels, perhaps,”

“Not good enough for the gods?”

“They are, my dear, but you did tell me not to call you god- you seem satisfied with angel.”

Donna laughs. “I see,”

“I would be more than happy to upgrade you, my love, I consider you the closest thing to a deity I can conceptualize.”

“Please don’t start using deity as a pet name,” Donna grins, leaning over to kiss a bit of syrup off the corner of his mouth.

He smiles, turning his face to kiss her again. “You called me _boyfriend_ , out in public where anyone could have heard. But very well. What about goddess?”

“Hm, I think that would be acceptable,”

“Very well, my goddess, thy will be done.”

Giggling, Donna flicks a rogue blueberry at him. “You’re silly, Chuck,”

“I am but a simple follower of your religion, my Donna,”

“Do I get sacrifices?”

“If you want them,” Charles smirks. “I can think of a few worthy candidates, beginning I think with some of the more zealous Colonels I encountered. Perhaps Macarthur himself.” Donna shakes her head, laughing. “I didn’t mean _human_ sacrifice, Chuck, Jesus, I meant like- oranges and stuff,”

“Ah. Well, I can certainly arrange that, if you wish.”

“I can’t-” She’s still giggling, “I can’t believe you went right to human sacrifice,”

He shrugs, laughing. She thinks he’s laughing simply because she is, the light in his eyes sparking when he looks at her. "It seemed a modest proposal,"

“Oh, god," Donna leans toward him, giggling. "You- you’re so beautiful, Charles,”

His laughter fades into a smile, and he ducks his face slightly. “Thank you, Donna,”

“I’m going to tell you all the time. I’ve just decided- my first act as a goddess. I’m handing down ten commandments and I’ll think of the other nine later. The first is, Chuck gets to hear how lovely he is every day,”

“Hm. A beneficent ruler, though with somewhat odd priorities.”

Donna shakes her head, finishing her pancakes and setting her plate aside. “I think my priorities are perfect,”

“ _You_ are perfect,” Charles counters, and she leans over his empty plate for a proper kiss, deep and tasting of syrup and blueberries. “Oh, Donna,” his eyes are still closed when she draws back. “I- I love when you do that,”

She smiles. “When I kiss you?”

“When you kiss me like- like-”

Cupping his face in her hands, she smiles. “I’ve rendered you speechless. Better do it again.” She leans in, kiss even slower this time, biting gently at his lower lip. His mouth opens easily, and she feels him tremble slightly as she touches the tip of her tongue to his upper lip. “Charles,” she breathes his name as she leans back. “I love you,”

“Yes,” his eyes open slowly. “That’s it precisely, you kiss me like you love me,”

Her heart does something close to what she imagines the moment gas becomes plasma is like, electric and strange. “I love you so _much_ , Charles, I- I’m glad you can feel it, when I kiss you.” She leans in to do it again, taking his plate and setting it beside hers on the tray. His hand comes up to tangle in her hair, and the frisson that goes through her when their lips meet makes her think that her heart must still be giving off sparks. “Oh,” she leans into him, hand on his chest, the other going around his shoulders, holding him to her, trying to form an ionic bond. Charles makes a soft whimpering sound in his chest, pulling her into his lap, and Donna melts there, pressing herself to as much of him as she can.

“I love you,” Charles whispers into the minute space between them, his lips brushing hers as he speaks.

“I love you too,” she answers without pulling back. “I’m- I’m so glad I met you. It feels like- like nothing I’ve ever felt, I don’t think there are words, I’ve tried. I tried in my letters, I’ve tried here, darling, I- I could create an entire language devoted to simply telling you how I feel, and it still wouldn’t communicate this- I’m filled with light,”

His lips curve into a gentle smile as he cradles her close. “My angel. Of course you are. That’s who you are. You are incandescent.”

“You- I feel like the sun,”

“I’ve told you before, dearest, you’re my sun, and all my stars.”

Donna smiles. “Jesus, Chuck, that’s so beautiful.”

“Not as beautiful as you are,”

“You ruined it,”

“Did not,”

“Did too,” she kisses under his jaw, smiling, and moves out of his lap to set the tray on the ground. “Come here, Charles, please,” she stretches back. “I want to hold you without having to fold up,”

He stretches out beside her, and she runs her fingertips down his chest. He catches her hand and kisses it softly. “What would you like, Donna Marie, my goddess?”

“You, Chuck, as usual. As always. In any way you like.”

His eyes drop, avoiding hers, and his hand squeezes hers tightly. “I- I _wish_ -” taking a deep breath, his eyes close. “I want to be what you need. What you- found in San Francisco.”

“You _are_ exactly what I need,” Donna tells him, taking his face in her hands. “Charles, listen to me, please. You are what I need. Just you. All of you, exactly the way you are. San Francisco- I needed to answer some questions about myself, but now that I have, that's it. You’re all that I want. Why do you think you’re not what I need?”

“Because I never _have_ been,” his voice is quiet, pained, and he still isn’t looking at her. Donna lets go of his face to wrap her arms around his waist. “No matter what I do. I've never- I've never _been enough,_ not- for anyone.”

“You are now. For me. You’re enough, Charles, and you’re not broken.”

He’s holding her in return, arms tight, his face buried in her shoulder, and it’s lucky that he won’t ever tell her who made him feel this way, because Donna thinks she could change her mind about human sacrifice. Maybe Honoria knows who it was.

“Charles,” she holds him as close as she can, twining her legs with his. “I love you just the way you are.”

“Thank you. I’m sorry- I- I apologize, my dear,” Charles is drawing back, but Donna won’t let go. “It’s only that I- I want to give you everything you want.”

She looks him in the eye, arms and legs still wrapped around him. “I adore you. I want you, the way you are. When I say I want you, Charles, I mean that I want you for who you are, how you are, in any way that makes you happy. You mean too much to me for me to want you to- be anyone you’re not.”

“Donna… I adore you as well, my angel. My goddess. You are- you are perfect." He takes a deep breath. "I'm- my apologies."

“That was a very good short compliment,” Donna smiles, leaning in to kiss him. “Now- if I let you go, dear, are you going to pull away and try to hide from me?”

Charles shakes his head.

“Good. Will you hold me?”

“It would be my greatest honor and joy,” Charles’ voice is soft, and it would sound ridiculous coming from anyone else, but from him it makes her feel precious, and she lets him go, curling closer to his chest, tracing circles on his soft pyjama shirt. “I love you, my Donna Marie.”

“I love you too, Charles.”

Donna loses track of time, as they lie there, his hand stroking her back and hers on his chest. Soon she realizes that the arm she’s tucked under her is going numb. “Chuck. I can’t feel my arm.”

“Hm? Ah,” he rolls onto his back, and she sits up, shaking her arm out.

Looking at him lying there, in his satiny pyjamas, Donna smiles. “Ain't love grand?" 

"Hm?"

"Ah, you know, I was just thinking. Being here with you... it's wonderful. It took a lot for me, though, to sort of... I don't know, Chuck, accept that I _wanted_ to be here. I've never been in love like this. You make me feel- giddy. But it's still work. You know?"

"Yes," he says seriously, reaching up to stroke her face. "I do know, Donna. I am not... naturally prone to taking risks. But you make me trust that any risk I might take will be worth the reward. All these things about you- that I might have tried to convince myself wouldn't fit in my life, that you're from the West Coast, that you're new money, as it were," he smiles when she rolls her eyes. "Donna, I _love_ you, and those things that might have broken things with someone else, they don't matter. Not in any meaningful way, at any rate. At the end of all things, my dear, it is simply you and I and blueberry pancakes, and that is worth the world."

Donna smiles down at him. "May I sit in your lap, Chuck?”

“If you’d like,” he moves slightly up the bed, to lean against the pillows, propped at something more than a ninety degree angle but less than lying flat. Swinging her leg over his hips, she is immediately in love with the sight of him below her, looking up at her as though he could see those sparks of immortal fire in her eyes. “May I?” Her hand hovers over his chest, and when he nods she smooths her hands softly over his upper arms, his chest, his stomach, mapping the feel of him beneath her hands. Entranced, she moves to his sides, and he laughs, startling. Donna tightens her thighs around his hips like she’s riding a mechanical bull- a comparison he’d probably detest until his last breath- and laughs with him, leaving off the light motion of her fingertips.

“I didn’t know you were ticklish,”

He takes a breath, smiling up at her, reaching up to run his hand over her shoulder, down her arm. “And if you tell another soul retribution will be swift,”

“Mm, what a thing to say to a girl,”

“Donna- may I- may I touch you?”

She smiles down at him. “You already are, Chuck,”

He rolls his eyes. “I mean-”

“I know. Yes, anytime, any way you like,” She bends to kiss him, fond. “Thanks for asking,”

“Thank you for allowing me,”

“Don’t make me sound so selfless,”

He smiles at that, his fingertips under her shirt, hands around her hips gently. “Donna- you have freckles,”

She grins, tipping out of his lap to lie on her back, unfastening the lowest buttons on her shirt. “Look- I have a birthmark, too. It’s a heart.”

“How fitting,” Charles bends to look. “But this is clearly a star, my dear,”

“Yeah, but a heart makes a better story,” Donna smiles as he presses a light kiss to the mark, which sits at the lowest point of the rise of her rib cage. “Oh, Charles,” she sighs, running her hand up the back of his head, mussing his curls. “I love you.”

His voice is as gentle as the kisses he’s pressing to her skin, mouth following his hands over her body. “I love you too,”

Charles is counting her freckles like rosary beads, and Donna stretches herself out under his hands, feeling his worship in his touch. “I- I’ve never-” her breath is shaky. “I’ve never been loved like this, Charles,”

He looks up at her, and he looks like a devotional, makes her feel the warmth of a halo around her head, on the back of her neck. She isn’t sure she deserves one, but he makes her want it. “It’s the best I can do,” he tells her, and somehow sounds _ashamed_ , and if that’s not the pinnacle of their biblical back and forth, Catholic guilt thorny like a crown, she doesn’t know what possibly could be.

“It’s amazing,” she says, honestly. “You amaze me. You- you _awe_ me. I-” her breath shakes, and she knows she might cry, hopes he doesn’t mind. “I don’t know what I could possibly have done to deserve you, Charles.”

He shakes his head, eyes closed, pressing a kiss to the freckle that sits in the hollow of her hip. “Taking pity on me is blessing enough, my dear,” his hands are so gentle as they move across her skin, his fingertips light as though he’s reading her by touch, over her freckles and the stretch marks that pattern her hips. “It was never a question of your deserving me. Rather the opposite.”

“Don’t talk like that, Chuck. Please.”

He hums, crawling up to kiss her forehead. “Then you don’t either. D’accord?”

“Alright,” she smiles. Then, with far too much bravado, she flings her arms around his shoulders: “We’re both incredible.”

She can feel his answering smile against her skin as he shakes his head and settles in beside her, tucking her head under his chin and pulling her close. “I love you,” he yawns. “Tonight has been perfect, my dear, thank you.”

“You’re welcome, Charles. Blueberry pancakes in bed, any time you like. Because I love you too.” Donna is quiet for a moment. “I...I did something else in San Francisco. I saw BJ. I went to the hospital, found him in the directory." She smiles, remembering. "I just popped into his office and asked if I could take him to lunch. It took him a second to recognize me- he said, 'you've got the wrong bunkie. Actually, you're not even on the right coast! But lucky for you I know a great airport,' and we went to lunch and talked about being stateside and his family and you. Mostly you. He drove me to the airport the next day."

"I must remember to thank him." Charles’ arm tightens around her waist, his voice slow with impending sleep. She rolls over, wrapping herself around him, pressing her face against his chest.

“I’m sorry I didn’t come earlier,” Donna says, quiet, her voice almost muffled in his chest. “I- I wanted to. Some days I was close to writing you something stupid, just to write you anything. Other- other times- I was so angry. At the war, and my city, and myself. And I,” she whispers, making him bend his head to hear her, “I thought to myself, what does it matter, he’s only your soulmate,”

Charles’ arms tighten, a catch in his throat. He feels like he’s in church, like he can’t remember the words to a hymn everyone else knows.

Donna continues, “I think I was- maybe I was trying to hurt myself, I don’t know, but I know I hurt _you_ , and I’m sorry. It was stupid. I didn’t think it through.” She holds him tightly. “It was good to take time to figure myself out, but I should have told you that’s what I was doing. I should have sent you a letter, anything, just- I’m so sorry. I didn’t think about you too hard because it hurt, I missed you, and I knew- I knew I needed to come here. I felt so guilty, every day I didn’t, and that- that made me angry. I told you. I’m not used to missing someone. I’ve never- felt like my heart was irrevocably gone.”

“My angel,” Charles murmurs into her hair. “You needn’t feel guilty. You’ve done nothing wrong. We all have free will, we all have… our own private little wars. I am not here for the purpose of condemning you for how you fight yours. I- I wish more than anything that you had written. I missed you. And I thought you didn’t- But it is in the past. You are here, now,” he holds her to his chest, meaning _here with me_ more than he means anything else. They could be in Tokyo or Toledo or on the moon, he can’t imagine it mattering so long as they were tangled together just so, her skin warm against his. Her hair smelling of cherry blossoms. “I thought of coming to Portland. Knocking on every door. Loitering at the mansion you wrote me about, wandering the park you mentioned. It- I should have.”

Donna shakes her head. “I wasn’t there. I… I went to San Francisco, I went to the coast, I even drove up almost to Canada. I just… it wasn’t right. I couldn’t figure out where I needed to be. No… I knew where I needed to be. I just- had a little battle with myself. I knew I wasn’t going to let go of you, Chuck, you’re too wonderful. But I… it took me time to get used to wanting to be held onto.”

“You’re a wanderer,”

She smiles, her eyes only a little watery. “I am.”

“Perhaps… I might ‘tag along?’” Donna can hear his eyebrows raising, the careful way he asks.

Moving up his body, pressing kisses to his chest, neck, along his soft jawline before she finally comes to his mouth, she murmurs, “Please. I’d love to have you. I don’t want to go anywhere without you, anymore.” She smiles against his lips. “I’ll get you a sidecar for my motorcycle,”

He shifts. “Donna, you _don’t_ ,”

“I do,”

He groans. “A _biker _, for the love of god- I’m going to be disowned,”__

__“Perfect; Honoria will get everything and we can move to Maine. I’ll bring you down every weekend in the sidecar. We can even wear helmets if you ask nicely.”_ _

__“ _Donna_ ,”_ _

__“Charles,” she repeats back, kissing him again. “I don’t have my bike on this coast. I’d love to go look for a new one, tomorrow.”_ _

__“ _Donna_!” He sounds distressed, and she laughs._ _

__“Come on, Chuck, where’s that Charles river sense of adventure?”_ _

__‘ “I suppose the _pneumonia_ killed it!”_ _

__Donna laughs, curling around him. “I adore you, Charles, and I’m going to revive it. You think mouth to mouth would help?” She presses kisses to both his cheeks before hovering just over him, her nose touching his, so close to kissing, and smiles._ _

__He smiles back. “Perhaps we ought to find out.”_ _

__“Hm, for scientific purposes, of course,”_ _

__“Spirit of inquiry,” Donna agrees, smiling as she kisses him._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Title of this chapter comes from Los Ageless by St. Vincent https://youtu.be/h9TlaYxoOO8


	9. Let Us Cling Together

They’re in the music room, Donna playing piano, and when she looks up from Chopin Charles’ eyes are on the stack of classical records beside his record player, dusty in the corner.

“It’s not ‘variety of taste.’” Donna observes. “There’s something _about_ Classical.”

Charles sighs. “Korea, as most things are _about_ these days,” It’s getting easier to talk about, after seeing Sidney a few times. After seeing Pierce, in Maine. Perhaps one day soon he will try listening to Chopin in recorded form.

“Tell me more,” his angel stands from the piano bench and curls into the armchair beside him, tucking her feet under her, looking at him attentively.

He reaches over, brushing his hand down her face. She leans into the touch, and his thumb strokes over her jaw for a moment as he collects his words. "It’s not Classical, actually. It’s my records. I find I cannot focus. I used to- I would play a record, Mussorgsky or Wagner, something with some," He stands to pace, his hand clenches in midair as he gestures, jaw jutting, and she listens with empathy but also with a little soap bubble of pity in her chest as the man she loves talks about loss. " I can't." His hand caresses the top of his record player, its lid closed. "If I try, the only focus I am rewarded with is- well, ‘Here's the smell of the blood still,’"

"Oh, darling." Donna has seen too many wounds to compare how she feels to a stab, but it's sharp in her chest. Her voice comes out quiet, and she can't make it louder. "I'm so sorry. I know how important it was to you, to be able to listen to your records. Is there anything I can do to help?”

Charles reaches for her, bending to kiss her forehead. “You already do. You- before you arrived, I had only listened to music in concert halls. I can’t play the way you can. My hands- make the notes, but not with… soul.”

“Oh, Chuck,” Donna reaches up, taking his hands. “I love you.”

“I love you too, Donna Marie, and there are simply no words to express what you have done for me. Ever since I met you, you have been my… my everything.” He squeezes her hands tightly, looking down at her, and she loves him so much in that crystallized moment that it makes her chest feel tight. "Thank you."

She takes a difficult breath. “Chuck… I’m sorry you lost your music. The way it was, with your habits and all. I hope it gets better, with time. Maybe Sidney-”

"He has helped,” Charles confesses. “The records… are just one piece of a wartime mosaic. I lost my place at the hospital, my music, something of myself…” He takes a breath, and Donna breathes with him, feeling tears rise in the back of her throat. “And I gained an understanding of what it means to come home," his hand covers hers, bending close to kiss her forehead impossibly softly, and her eyes are shining with tears but when they meet his she smiles anyway. "Donna-" his hand goes to his breast pocket. "My dear, I am aware that this may be the worst possible time to ask, but I cannot wait another moment to add something gained, something invaluable, to balance my personal ledger with the war." He holds a ring between his first finger and thumb, sinking to his knees in front of her. "Donna Marie, my angel,"

Tears dripping from her chin now, she doesn't let him finish. "Yes. Charles, yes, stand up." She dashes her hand across her face. "Kiss me, please."

He's smiling wider than she's ever seen him do sober. "Anytime you like, my dear," he wipes her tears with the pad of his thumb and catches her jaw in his hand, tipping her face up gently to meet him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> another chapter title from Teo Torriatte https://youtu.be/Ge18n2JCwBs which is a BIG Charles/Donna mood because of the amazing and wonderful onekisstotakewithme, whose Charles/Donna fic lovingly called Spies is the actual best fic in the whole world. https://archiveofourown.org/works/21102059/chapters/50210912 Go forth and enjoy <3


End file.
